Hey, first post, I've read stuff here from time to time; you guys obviously are the authority on all this, I just haven't always had the bankroll/credit to take advantage of all the great deals.

Anyways - sorry if this is the wrong forum, in my head it made sense here.

Is there a website, or some way, to figure out what's the "best airline" for a specific route? (I would define "best" as usually the cheapest/with the most flights/easiest to book awards on -- a mixture of those I guess?)

If that's not an option, maybe someone can just help me out and lend me a hand.

I'm starting law school in DC this fall, and so will probably make a decent number of roundtrips from Tampa from this point forward; I'm open to flying into any of the three (BWI/DCA/IAD) airports, but I'd like to try and pick an airline to maximize miles and get a CC to match.

Thoughts?

Thanks for your help.

Welcome to FT.
In reply to your question, I would suggest United, though not the cheapest, The award posibilities are good with Star alliance partners. That is if you can work around the starnet blocking.
There are many mileage earning opportunities available. You can start out with 30k sign-up bonus with the Visa.

Welcome to flyertalk!

While Dulles is a hub for United, I'd suggest Southwest. Has a number of non-stop flights from BWI mainly, few from Dulles too at prices that will be hard to beat from United.

Regarding credit card, think there's a promotion going on with Visa from Chase:
http://www.southwest.com/rapid_rewards/visa.html

Good Luck!

I'll throw my vote in for US Airways, because I think DCA is better than IAD. Shorter security lines, the metro station and being close to downtown. Looks like US Airways has 5 direct flights daily to TPA. Also, being Star Alliance if you happen to get a good deal out of IAD on United, you can still earn miles on US Airways.

Southwest and AirTran might have the best prices on that route, but the competition is big and United/US Airways/Delta will be pretty close. The major advantage, however, is that with the latter airlines you can redeem the miles for tickets to more exotic destinations (think international), rather than just BWI-TPA again.

You write that you'll be starting law-school. Is that at GW or Georgetown by any chance? If so, then DCA will me 100x more convenient than BWI, believe me.

You can credit both the flights on United and US Airways to the same account with either airline. For an occasional flyer, I feel like US Airways makes it easier to earn miles and top-off the account with things other than flying via various promotions and partner offers.

So I'd start with one Star Alliance account for sure. Both UA and US have decent weekly weekend fares that will often be available to TPA; you might be able to take advantage of those from time to time.

On a grad-student budget, I find that AirTran to BWI is kindest on my wallet. The other perks of AirTran are:

• relatively easy to attain elite status
• free same-day standby for any flight (can't do that on AA!)
• easy trade in "miles" (points, actually on FL) for award tickets
• decent customer service for a budget airline. I've never had to wait more than 5 minutes to talk to a real person via phone.

If you are living and attending school in DC,I agree that US out of DCA is probably your best bet for flights.But I would join United's FF program and credit your US flights to UA. Try to get one of the UA credit cards if you qualify.

United also has a 10K bonus for students upon graduation.
http://www.united.com/page/middlepag...8,1271,00.html

You must sign up for College Plus prior to graduation


If you are living closer to BWI,then Southwest is a good choice.

Hey, thanks everybody for the different suggestions and help.

I think I'd prefer to go US or UA for way-down-the-road international awards; since they're both Star Alliance, wouldn't it be better for me to go US since UA apparently does some blocking of partners? Or am I understanding that wrong? Or is there something UA has that US couldn't do?

For the record, I'm going to American Univ. (in NW DC). I've flown in or out from all three of the airports at one point or another, and yeah, Reagan would be easiest, but I'll do whatever works for the money/miles.

The truth is, even if I pick a carrier/alliance (US probably it looks like), if there's ever a huge fare discrepancy, I'll just obviously go for the cheapest. Just figured I could start trying to concentrate on one program now then do the heavy lifting for miles post-graduation.

It's called Starnet Blocking, apparently, and that's my understanding as well. US also seems to be easier, as noted, to earn miles outside of flying, with all of their promotions, as well as the Starwood AMEX (great 30,0000 point bonus running right now, by the way), which pays an effective 1.25 miles per dollar (in batches of 20,000 starpoints) into US, but not United (their relationship with Chase seems to have caused them to gimp their transfers from Starwood).

I'm unware of anything United can give you that US can't, but I'm hardly an expert there.