Only water, EWR-BOS?
 

I was on UA 994, EWR-BOS tonight in Y, and I was very surprised that the only service during the flight consisted of an FA walking up and down the aisle twice with a tray of cups filled with water. I realize that it's only a 50-minute flight, but if memory serves me there's usually a soft-drink service and a bag of peanuts NYC-BOS. Certainly on B6, but I thought on UA as well. If it's really just water, remind me never to book a connection through EWR if I can help it. I was really looking forward to a Diet Coke --- I would have just brought one on if I knew I was only getting water! (As far as I can tell on United.com it indicates for this flight, "Economy: Beverage Service", which implies more than just water to me, anyway).

Maybe this also seemed worse because of the extreme contrast, since I had just flown 15 hours on NH, PVG-NRT, and NRT-JFK.

Not the norm.

I have seen the same thing on EWR-BTV and EWR-YUL morning flight the were only offering water and coffee recently all pre-poured in those little cups. Did you actually ask though? I didn't ask. They might just be doing this to save time or they might only load water?

Its 200 miles......the goal is to make sure everyone gets a cup who wants one on such a short flight i guess. I bet you they would have given you one if they had one on board, if its loaded. I havn't flown ewr-bos in forever i avoid those short routes like the plague, im Amtrak all the way anything between DC and Boston! Way too many delays in the air

Recently saw the same thing (operate by UA Express) tray of water, tray of OJ/Water and tray of coke.

Another flight, same routing (operated by GoJet on behalf of United), offered the full beverage cart.

DL offers full cart service.

Usually full cart on this route. But, all it takes is a little turbulence or a weird routing and there can be almost no airtime useable for service.

That said, I've never seen a FA deny someone what they ask for except, on occasion, coffee when there's turbulence.

The question is was there turbulence? Sounds more like lazy FA's.

As does UA.

Only water, EWR-BOS?
 

I've experienced water-only service on EWR-DCA.

Last month I flew BOS-EWR in Y cabin there are only water and OJ:td: despite we had a very smooth flight!

My limited experience (~6 segments per year) on this route is that it varies between water only and full cart service in Y. Surprisingly, even though BOS-EWR is a longer flight (southbound route is generally BOS-BDL-SWF-EWR at around 50 minutes, instead of the northbound EWR-HVN-PVD-BOS at around 40 minutes), I've seen more water-only service on the southbound flight than the northbound flight.

In F, I've had the pre-departure beverage service and another drink service almost immediately after the double-chime on departure. Inflight service comes with a bag of nuts or biscoff cookies.

I asked for a Diet Coke and was told "it's only a 40 minute flight, no time to bring out the cart". There was no turbulence and the captain left the seatbelt sign off for at least 25 minutes.

I also prefer to stay on the ground between NYC and BOS, but yesterday's flight was part of a connection back to BOS from PVG!

The same on LAS-LAX some time ago. The following week I flew from VIE (Austria) to KRK (Southern Poland) on an OS flight - which is even shorter than LAS-LAX - they did snack service (complimentary) plus full drink service (including complimentary wine/beer). Just an indication how low level US Airline industry reached...

Whats crazy is when you fly airlines in Europe and Asia (especially asia) that do a full meal service in Y on 45 minute flights. It may be a simple sandwich or something of that sorts, but they serve the entire cabin like clockwork.

Fly on AC YOW-YYZ this morning.

38 minute flight on a 319.

12 of us in F with one FA got the drink of our choice served on a tray with a continental breakfast (no choices). There was one round of refills.

2 FAs in Y and they got a full cart service with some sort of packaged cookie.

38 minutes in the air! 1hr, 8 mins blocked gate to gate.