Kacee

I was talking about the differential between F on SFO-EWR and J on SFO-JFK. I know because I snagged several of those cheap SFO-EWR fares. IIRC, they were around $1500, while ps J was over $4K.

EWR just won't support the fares UA wants for ps, which is going to lead ultimately to ps fading away. The merged airline has never understood the market for this service, which is why they've failed at JFK and are now retreating to fortress EWR.
You are not the people taking black cars from midtown law firms to JFK. Those people are not going to take the train to EWR. They are going to fly AA/DL/B6. UA will lose traffic, and it's exactly the traffic they most want to keep.

airzim

Interesting development.

As someone who's lived in Manhattan for the last 10 years, I used the ps flights quite a bit given the price was significantly cheaper than flying out of EWR. Plus it was easier to use a RPU. But for every other flight, I used EWR since it was significantly closer than trudging out to JFK.

Moving to EWR makes a lot of sense. Other than the seat and WiFi, the product from EWR and JFK today is identical. If they bridge that gap it will a good win, and allow then the sell flat bed West Coast-Europe 1 stop connections over EWR.

However if this remains as ps, does that mean the end of complimentary upgrades on LAX/SFO ex EWR?

lhrsfo

I disagree on the snobbery factor, although I agree that the SFO/OAK analogy isn't great, since the metro area is so much smaller than NYC. The better analogy is LHR/LGW. Depending upon where you are going, LGW has much better connections into London than LHR, whether by rail or by car. But, it's seen as a second airport and most airlines don't want to know. STN is the same, with good connections especially to the financial center by rail but that's a tertiary airport and only Ryanair wants to know.

You might get savvy people flying from the secondary or tertiary airport (easier for me to get to from where I originate, always playing the one-up angle) but most people still gravitate to the principal airport - especially foreigners (I know many NYLON types who have never been to EWR and affect not to know where it is) and people unfamiliar with NYC geography.

No doubt UA as a secondary airline can remove itself from the top routes and the top airports and survive. But this is not the action of a leading airline.

mherdeg

AC, AI, OS, LH, SK, LX, TP. See http://www.staralliance.com/en/servi...on/airport/ewr .

Both Lufthansa and SAS have fairly nice lounges at the international-carrier terminal B pier at EWR. They are accessible with a *G card and a UA domestic boarding pass, as you would expect, although it takes some effort to get into that pier.

TommyC80

Good riddance. Getting to JFK is a debacle from almost everywhere on the island of manhattan if you travel during waking hours. I've spent more time getting cross town in the middle of the day than I'd like to admit. And your next best option is connecting from the ACE to a 20 minute ride on the air train? No thanks.

The lounge in T7 was a joke and the lack of dedicated precheck didn't help matters either. Glad to see this place go.

I wonder what they will do about those of us already cleared into R? Hopefully they leave us where we are.

One downside I can see here is no longer being able to do mileage upgrades without a copay east-coast to west-coast. I also assume that CPU will be going away from EWR, though I doubt that mattered much unless you are GS.

Adelphos

When it comes to the "snob factor" and ranking NYC airports, in reality none of the NYC airports can be considered "top airports," so I'm not sure that should be a deciding factor.

hirohito888

There's also MS (Egyptair), *A carrier that only flies to JFK and not any other *A hub in the US.

But good point about the profit. There's also a cost side for UA to operate out of JFK, and at $1000 RT fares, maybe it's too low for UA to justify the continued costs.

dgdevil

Good news for this leisure flier. JFK is over-rated and has horrible public transit to Manhattan. Just leave LGA unscathed. That's a great little airport, and convenient.

To the "snob factor" mentioned a few posts above - 100% correct. NYC airports are an embarrassment in general vs. Asia, Europe.

Kacee

Bingo. B6 started a fare war, and they won. UA is fleeing to fortress hub. And to the victor, the spoils: As mduell notes upthread, B6 will pick up a ton of codeshare traffic from the international airlines that currently codeshare with UA in and out of JFK.

char777

I looked it up. International Star routes to JFK:
(Bold indicates route not duplicated at EWR by same carrier)
(Italics indicates route duplicated by UA at EWR)

AC: YYZ
CA: PEK
AI: DEL, BOM
NH: NRT
OZ: ICN
OS: VIE
AV: BOG, CLO, CTG, MDE, PEI, SAL, SAP
SN: BRU
MS: CAI
BR: TPE
LO: WAW
LH: FRA, MUC
SQ: FRA (SIN)
SA: JNB
LX: GVA, ZRH
TK: IST

International Star routes to EWR:
(Bold indicates route not duplicated at JFK by same carrier)
(Italics indicates route duplicated by a Star carrier at JFK)

AC: YYC, YYZ, YVR, YUL
AI: BOM, AMD
OS: VIE
LH: DUS, FRA, MUC
SK: CPH, OSL, ARN
LX: ZRH
TP: LIS, OPO
UA: AMS, ANU, AUA, BCN, PEK, TXL, BHX, BOG, BRU, CUN, DEL, DUB, EDI, FRA, GVA, GLA, GUA, HAM, HKG, LIM, LIS, LHR, MAD, MAN, MEX, MXP, MBJ, BOM, MUC, NAS, PTY, CDG, POS, PLS, POP, PVR, PUJ, SJO, SJD, SAP, SDQ, STI, GRU, PVG, SNN, SXM, STT, TLV, NRT, ZRH
UA seasonal: BFS, BZE, BDA, BON, CZM, GCM, LIR, NCL, OSL, FCO, SAL, YYT, UVF, STT, ARN, YVR, VCE

Really I think it's a wash, especially considering how many more connections UA can offer ex-EWR on their own metal to the destinations of most of those carriers that only have a select few flights to JFK. SK and TP appear to be the odd Star carriers that have selected EWR over JFK. So basically, unless if you're going to Cairo, somewhere in Colombia that's not Bogota, Taipei, Seoul, Warsaw, Istanbul, or Johannesburg, you can catch a flight to the same destination from EWR, even if (shudder) it's on UA metal, which is probably what UA cares more about anyway.

It's also worth considering that there's probably a fair amount of duplication if you also include IAD as well.

as219

Possibly? This move effectively means the end of Queens/Brooklyn/Long Island pax flying UA to the west coast. While most of the premium-cabin traffic comes from Manhattan, you still have to fill the backs of planes with people. Where will they come from? Local O&D? Connections to *A flights? I'm scratching my head here.

And by the way, EWR is "convenient" as the crow flies, but making the subway-to-NJ Transit-to-Airtrain connection with heavy bags is no picnic, and cabs to/from EWR get really expensive, really quickly, not to mention the horrible tunnel delays that can't be avoided. I never willingly choose EWR over JFK from Midtown.

I'm sure the beancounters have lots of spiffy charts and graphs justifying the move, but it sure smells like retreat.

meFIRST

If you didn't need more reasons to leave United this is it.

What JFK has that EWR does not ( for the ps crowd) is the 30 minute check in luggage cut off). EWR I think 45 minutes?

I once showed up 25 minutes before the flight and was accepted ( with supervisor approval) luggage and myself, walked to the plane. I made it ( with checked bags)

There is no way this is happening at EWR with the security line.

EWR764

It also signals a desire to return to the pre-merger UA strategy of providing international premium connectors with quality products on domestic transcon segments. Before, most connections between UA's largest international hubs of EWR and SFO were on narrowbody equipment with small, substandard F cabins.

Now, UA can sell premium itineraries from either coast to the entire Europe or Asia networks with flat bed seats all or nearly all the way. If the local traffic isn't generating a premium, then UA can look to flow to make up the difference. That wasn't possible at JFK with limited/no online feed and impractical connections to partners.

Vulcan

So let me get this straight. UA is going to promote a PS experience at EWR where between say 3:30 and 7 PM there are no seats available in either of the clubs. Won't this make that situation worse??????

gengar

Note the "European" qualifier. There are quite a few non-European *A carriers that serve JFK and not EWR, and that's what the FT'ers in the IAD-JFK thread were complaining about.