New Routes
 

Among other things trickling out:

DEN-PSP
DEN-LIT
MKE-PIE is moving back to TPA
MSN-MCO
DSM-MCO
OMA-MCO returns
DSM-TPA
OMA-TPA

Looks like most Florida flights are less-than-daily seasonal flying

Very interesting. Hopefully those Florida routes will work out and interesting to see them do some P2P from DSM. I think it is great to have a bigger presence in these Midwestern cities. Most of these are with the E90 correct?

Isn't this the third try for DEN-LIT?

Promotional fares being offered on these routes.

http://www.frontierairlines.com/fron...name=ebspecial

Company press releases:

http://media.frontierairlines.com/ar...rticle_id=5284
http://media.frontierairlines.com/ar...rticle_id=5283

Little Rock was added with the Frontier Jet Express initiative in October 2004, and was among destinations cut in mid 2008 after bankruptcy was filed.

Thanks for posting these additions, knope.

I particularly like that PSP has been added to the route map. Might have to take advantage of that!

I find it interesting they are going back to TPA from OMA after flipping over to PIE last year (2010) from TPA in 2009. I always found it interesting MKE, OMA, and MCI went to PIE and Denver went to TPA for a while. That was some easy cost savings there.

Please do! It is the only way they'll keep it around.

It may have been cheaper to fly to PIE but I think they lost customers in the shuffle. I had no idea PIE existed before they made the announcement and I bet a lot of consumers are in the same boat.

DEN-TPA
 

So F9 has one DEN-TPA flight, whereas WN has two. F9's tickets are a penny less than WN's on this nonstop, which occurs around the same time as WN's latest nonstop/

There are also multiple connection opportunities on some days DEN-XXX-TPA, where XXX can be DSM or MKE. MKE is expensive but has a quick connection...quick enough to beat out WN's one stop "quick turn" option. The problem here is that WN offers a nonstop DEN-TPA that arrives later and gets to TPA earlier than F9, for a lower price. But if you want a flight that gets to TPA from DEN around 6-7pm on F9, you've got one or two (or zero, depending on the day) options.

As usual though, Classic Plus on any F9 flight is cheaper than AT on WN.

Now add in three connecting flights from Airtran that are cheaper (by $20) than both F9 and WN, two of which are shorter than either F9 or WN connections. Plus a couple of direct UA flights for $17 more expensive than what F9 and WN are selling...the route must be a reasonably strong market.

As for DEN-PSP, United's pricing appears to be "we're the only ones offering nonstop service on this route" pricing. Then again, sub-daily on an E90 has a different market penetration style vs. 2x dialy on a CRJ.

Right now everyone else is one-stop DEN-PSP, and everyone is more expensive.

On DEN-LIT, F9 is the only cheap airline. One or two stop flights are significantly more expensive. Nonstops are over $400 one way, courtesy of a mix of United ERJs and CR7s (3x daily though).

The question is whether leisure and connecting traffic can fill an E90 once daily. Then again, there may be enough of a "Frontier Effect" (WN serves neither of these locations direct, and doesn't serve PSP at all) to keep a relatively small plane reasonably (say 80 pax/flt), where a mainline jet from someone else wouldn't work.

Didn't F9 moving back to TPA? This is where F9 is belonging there. Why F9 didn't like PIE? I thought those route is doing extremely very well. Can F9 will bring more specific routes from FSD/FAR/BIL-MCO/TPA?

Nobody knew about it, so the loss of traffic more than made up for the decreased costs there. Kind of like how Allegiant tried MCO instead of Sanford...except Allegiant moved back to Sanford when the experiment was all said and done.

Speaking of which, Allegiant is the big player at PIE. It's the Phoenix-Mesa to Tampa, so to speak. Or the Sanford to MCO. Frontier was kind of our of place there since it isn't a ULCC with a distinct aversion to planes built during this millennium :p

FSD/BIL, maybe. FAR, doubt it until F9 decides to serve DEN at that airport. Serving MCO/TPA (or, rather, PIE/SFB) without allowing connections to the rest of the US through a more centrally located airport is Allegiant's business model (and Airtran's to an extent, though that will change with the WN purchase), not Frontier's.

Examining the situation more closely, F9 isn't in FAR right now. In BIL they might be able to make a go of it since G4 only goes west of the Mississippi from there.

FSD would be...interesting. F9 has one evening flight into and out of there, on an E90. No connections are possible to TPA or MCO. Allegiant hits these routes with an M80 of some sort, twice a week during peak season, so 260-332 seats per week available. Fares very, but lowest I could find was $130 or so OW. The big question here is whether F9 can take an E90, throw it into FSD 3x a week (297 seats) and get the plane reasonably full. Or, for that matter, 1x a week on Saturdays, keeping in mind that Delta offers round-trips for $200 OW with a reasonable connection time.

How long with the Q400?
 

This article in the Aspen paper fears for continuing service DEN-ASE

http://www.aspendailynews.com/section/home/148443

What other destinations would be affected if those aeroplanes are sold?

It might last as long as LGB did.

I'd like to use it, but don't see much of a future. The 6:00 AM MKE departure isn't too appealing.

I'm pretty sure the other destinations could continue to be served with the E90 just fine. The hope is that with the runway extension F9 could try to get the E90 certified for ASE and get rid of the rest of the Q's. Personally I'd like to see them dump the CSeries in favor of a bunch of new Q's and operate a lot of short haul midwestern traffic to/from MKE but I don't think that day will come.