LarryJ

That is not how economics works.

beachmouse

They were tried back in the stone age of commercial aviation when they still chiseled the propellers out of rock.The firs time I flew as a wee mouse back in the 1970s, it was a Republic flight that started out with something like GRR-LAN-DTW and then another stop or two to MCO

And then deregulation happened and airlines and market determined they only made sense for:

1. Regions with a need for mixed cargo and passenger service that are off the road grid (Alaska)

2. Island regions where a mid to large-sized plane makes sense for passengers and cargo (the still running Micronesia island hopper- see the thread in the United forum for details)

3. Very small EAS airports where they're trying to fill up one small Dash or such between two airports for the 2x daily service to Denver or Seattle. I think Cape Air still has a few of these.

cbn42

Most people don't want to drive "a few hours" to fly on WN when they have an airport in their city. Perhaps you will, due to your hatred of regional jets, but you are in the minority. Flights to regional airports exist mainly because people are williing to pay a premium for them in order to avoid driving.

Southwest generally does not serve small airports. People in small towns can either fly a legacy airline from their own airports, or drive a couple of hours to fly Southwest. Some may do the latter to save money, and some won't.

Clearly the market disagrees with you, because these regional routes are doing just fine. They often command premium fares. If it weren't for the pilot shortage, there would be a lot more of them in the sky.

Then perhaps we should go back to the days of regulation, and you can convince the government to put a stop to these flights.

Airlines are constantly looking for new route opportunities, and they have a trove of data to analyze. If no other airline has expressed interest in trying milk runs for so many years, there is probably a reason for it.

You simply can't seem to accept that people have different preferences than you do, and that the market will respond to the preferences of all customers, not just yours. I doubt that all the legacy airlines are misunderstanding the domestic aviation market and missing out on opportunities to make more money by doing what you think they should do.

BiggAW

I guess it falls into some weird hole in the middle where it's not too small for mainline service, but it's too small for any meaningful competition, so you end up with one absurdly overpriced airline providing mainline air service there.

No, that's not the point at all. The point is about the way the WN operates versus the legacies, and how they just don't get it, and are getting klobbered by both LCCs and ULCCs.

I cannot explain why the legacies are so poorly run. It's not just regional jets. It's the whole experience, and the whole system. It's all tied together, as WN's low-cost operating model allows them to give more stuff away for free, and still have sometimes competitive ticket prices. The legacies, meanwhile, have a higher CASM, so they nickel and dime people for everything, and seem to act more like the cable company than anything else.

And it's not that I've magically solved their problems. I'm no genius, but WN has been doing stuff for years, and you'd think that the big airlines would have adapted what WN did to work on a legacy network. DL can't have one type of plane, but they could have started going to one type of domestic aircraft for all new purchases, either the B737 or the Airbus A32x series, using international aircraft for heavily traveled domestic routes as they already do. Even if the legacies can get FCM up to a reasonable rate where they aren't taking a bath on F, they could still do open seating in Y, no change fees, and two free checked bags. They just don't get it.

There's nothing to sell. You can Google Southwest Airlines and read all about it on the internet. Or look at stuff that the ULCCs are doing and see if any of that could relate to the legacy model.

1. AS is actually retiring the B734C fleet at the end of this summer, so all milk runs after that will be passenger aircraft, and the freight traffic will be entirely separate. Something about the schedules not meshing up well, although they have daily service, so I'm not sure. I'm so glad that I flew on the B734C several times.

2. True.

3. Those airports are tiny, and it sounds like they are way too small for service at all.

I still think the idea is interesting to have some milk runs flying around in certain areas. The upper west, and northern Michigan come to mind as good targets where you might not be able to support a single airport mainline service, but they are more than a few hours away from a major airport with mainline service.

They do now, because that's often the only place that they can find a reasonably priced ticket. Many of the big airports serve areas several hours out from their physical location. I would say that the majority of people who are several hours from a major mainline airport are going there because of prices, schedules, or connections, not because of rinky-dink-a-doo planes, although paying more for a lesser plane can't exactly help the situation.

Right. A lot of these airports are completely unnecessary in terms of commercial service. Luckily they killed GON with PVD, which are right next to each other. HVN has a turboprop flight to PHL, that thing needs to die, since it's right next to BDL. There are tons of other airports that don't need commercial service, as they are near a major airport or two or three. Most people will drive to the real airport anyway, since the tickets are generally outrageous from the small airports.

I guess there is a small market of short, rich, and lazy people. The problem is, this tiny niche is clogging up the system for everyone else. That's a terrifying thought, as there are already way too many of them. It sounds like this "pilot shortage" is another manufactured problem, like airport congestion at many of the big hubs, as there would be more than enough pilots if they flew fewer, larger aircraft, thus requiring fewer pilots. Reduce congestion, and you can turn crews faster and more reliably too.

That's an interesting conundrum, and there is no easy answer. I'd rather not see full regulation, as we've seen incredible innovation in the space since de-regulation, even though the mainlines are out of control with regional jets, and can't get out of their own way in terms of competing with WN. I think a start would be entities like PANY&NJ putting their foot down on how their airports are used in order to make them more efficient. That wouldn't change the whole country, but one by one, the airport operators could work to put a floor on airplane size, and reduce the number of slots available to aid in reducing congestion, thus forcing airlines to bring in bigger planes to handle the volume.

How do they have data on milk runs when no one has been running them in the Lower 48 for years?

The legacies should be operating in a way to maximize efficiency of the system for the most people, not catering to short, rich, and lazy people at the expense of the rest of everyone flying around. Also, the regional jets on mainline routes, the point of this thread, cater to literally no one. No one is going to miss the flights if they consolidate them on busy routes where they'd still have several flights a day on each route, just not like 10 flights on toy jets.

Well, somehow WN went from being an airline in Texas with a couple of routes to being by far the largest domestic airline, and the legacies still haven't responded to their competition in any meaningful way.

TheAbilityToucan

I was on several AA RJs in April on a trip to Charleston, SC, so here's my perspective. Disclaimer, I live near BOS but flew ex-MHT since it was cheaper. And I'm 5'11, so you can't say I'm short. Not the tallest, but not short.

The E175 MHT-PHL was operated by Republic...meh. Average. Felt like an older UA 737 but the seats were leather.

CRJ-200 PHL-CHS operated by Air Wisconsin was better than expected, really dark cabin and dinky but it didn't make me feel claustrophobic, and there was enough room but just enough.

Mainline A319 CHS-CLT was the worst of the bunch. It was a refurbished ex-US aircraft but there wasn't nearly enough legroom. Slimline seats were super uncomfortable.

CRJ-900 CLT-MHT was very very nice, a nextgen operated by PSA. Cabin was very bright considering the windows were large. It was reminiscent of a 787 and had oodles of legroom.

So actually I'd much rather have a modern RJ than even a newer refurbished mainline 737/A320 family.

MSYtoJFKagain

I flew that CRJ9 on a few legs recently and it's really quite a nice bird. You're right about the windows. I haven't been on a 787 yet but I've got a TATL flight for work that should let me give it a whirl soon.

BiggAW

The problem with the regionals, especially the CR2s and CR9s, is that they are just too small. I can't stand up in a CRJ, I'm 6'3", so at the upper end percentile wise for height, but not extremely tall. The older jets that are refurbed can be nice, like the DL MD-88s, but it really depends on seat pitch if you're tall.

CMK10

I've had the opposite experience of the OP. Ever since United started ordering more 737-800s/900s and picking up used A-319s they've been putting mainline onto routes that didn't used to have it. RDU-IAD/EWR/ORD for example has a much better shot at mainline now than it did five or six years ago. The same can be said for EWR-IAD which was all Express until recently.

Delta is similar ever since they bought so many 717-200s. Even tertiary cities get mainline now (AVL/FAY/GSO-ATL etc.).

BiggAW

That's all quite true, and progress in the right direction, but those are routes that should never have been regionals in the first place. Those are solidly mainline routes. DL is sort of on and off. They have gone through phases as to which mainline routes are served with mainline craft, and which are not.

BiggAW

So a friend at work has taught me the name for horrible, awful regional aircraft: Torture Chambers. So now I refer to anything that's not mainline as a torture chamber. I went up to Northern Michigan and back, through DTW and GRR, which was fine. I would have flown out of TVC if the prices were reasonable, but they weren't so GRR did the trick.

After looking through some schedules, and a bit of planespotting, I'd have to say that DL and UA are getting a bit less bad with the torture chambers, and AA is far and away the worst offender. The SDF problem is one extreme example, but I also saw a number of them going in and out of PVD, which is a mainline airport, and should have mainline aircraft for routes like PVD-PHL and PVD-CLT, the latter of which is currently split between torture chambers and mainline.

Kevin AA

Torture chambers?

BiggAW

Yes! It's a very fitting name for these awful little POS aircraft.

Yoshi212

The only RJ, in current operation, that I would put in the torture category is the CRJ-200. The ERJ-135/145 is fine for under 90 minutes and if you're in the A seat I find it to be fine for under 2 hours.
As for the CRJ-700/900 or ERJ-170/195 I rather like them. 2x2 in Y is rather nice. I give an edge to the ERJ over the CRJ for a bit more comfort and less overall noise. The CRJ in F is quiet but the farther you go back the louder it gets while I feel the ERJ doesn't get nearly as loud when near the engines due to their positioning.

Productivity

All the OPs reasons why WN are better basically sum up why I despise and virtually never fly them. I like assigned seating, I don't like having to line up just to get a decent seat (no seat saving which I despise and the few times I've seen it, I intentionally sit in the saved seat just to make a point). I like first class, book it reasonably regularly. I like that there are small jets that serve smaller markets, it lets me get where I'm going without having to add another major logistical leg onto the end. I like that they have higher frequency on smaller jets, gives me the option to book a time that works for me. Small jets out of hubs - fantastic.

The only redeeming factor about WN to me is the free checked baggage, but 90% of the time I have status so it's not an issue for me.

Just flew on an E190 today, beats every WN aircraft I've ever been on.

If you don't want to fly them, feel free not to. But I fully support them and will keep flying them. I'm 6'2" - I don't object to them - they fill a very valuable role

BiggAW

The CR-2 is the worst of the torture chambers, but the CR-7, CR-9, and ERJ145 are definitely torture chambers too. The E175 is debatable, especially in light of it's larger hull diameter, and shared design with the mainline E190.

The rear engine design seems to reduce noise, if anything, versus something like a 737. The MD-88 is not bad at all to actually fly on, even though it's loud as anything when you're on the ground. I saw one land at PVD the other day, and it was almost deafening at about a half mile away when they put reverse thrust on.

Not only free checked baggage, but no change fees. Those are just plain better than the legacies. The assigned seat model is rather antiquated. On WN, if you really want an aisle, you can buy EBCI for $15, and you're effectively guaranteed an aisle seat (I suppose everyone on the plane could buy it, you book last, and get a center, but in practice, you are guaranteed an aisle seat).

I fundamentally don't believe in first class, as it is a wasteful way to utilize aircraft and landing slots compared to the all-economy configuration of an aircraft, and I believe that all aircraft should be all-economy with a 31" or 32" pitch. Very few people both have and want to waste the dough on first class. Premium Economy is a thing now, which is basically a racket, since they took away so much legroom that it sometimes makes sense to pay more to get it back. What a deal. I love AS, you get 32" pitch standard, it makes medium- and long-haul flights so much easier.

High frequency flights just clog up the whole system and cause more delays for everyone.

Although it's not always the case, you could often fly direct on WN or another mainline carrier whose hub is located nearby, and avoid a connection, in which case, that will be faster than connecting through somewhere else to get on a torture chamber to fly directly to east middle of nowhere, even when accounting for drive time.

I don't, but it's a complete PITA when you have carriers like AA serving mainline airports like PVD with mostly torture chambers, when they should be 100% mainline operations. At least with east middle of nowhere airports, I know they are east middle of nowhere airports, so I wouldn't bother looking for tickets there in the first place. It's a complete PITA when you've got mainline airports that have a mix of services, and you have to weed through the bookings to figure out what is on torture chambers and what is on a real commercial mainline aircraft.

The booking sites, as well as the airlines own sites should have options for filtering flights based just that carrier, with the ability to add torture chamber operators, with a separate option for alliance partners to be able to better filter out flights that are operated by other carriers. Plus, the government should not allow regional operators to use the livery of the mainline operator. They should have to have their own, distinct livery, and then cross-ticket. I bet that should put an end to most of the torture chamber operators really quickly.