buckeyefanflyer

A few years ago as a result of the large increase in jet fuel prices, UA pulled out of PBI and FLL and consolidated everthing into MIA. They never really had much service out of PBI but do you think they would re-instate FLL service. say the UA-CO merger does not happen, you can still go to FLL
on CO (partner service). The bottom line is UA is the only airline that pulled out of FLL and it is a pretty good market. B6, WN, and especially Spirit have added alot of service there, but if you are just going to south Florida FLL is
alot more convienent then MIA to get in and out of.

eerickso

Don't know the answer but I'm one who certainly wishes they would! I fly to FLL from IAD pretty regularly for personal travel and am always faced with taking connecting flights into FLL (doubling the flight time) or flying non-stop to MCO and driving (inconvenient and long drive) or flying into MIA (inconvenient and pricey). Another choice is to fly US from DCA (inconvenient and pricey due to price of ticket and the cab fare to DCA from the suburbs) or ditching *A completely for a discount carrier (most cost effective and convenient option). For short trips for personal travel it's tough to avoid that last option.

tom911

Did UA pull out of FLL because of the revenue mix there (more leisure than business)? Has that changed the last few years?

Tom at IAD

sobore

I wish they would return to PBI, but I'll take FLL.
The daily ORD-PBI flight seemed to always be pretty full, so I know the PAX volume is there.

channa

That's not exactly a compelling reason to get UA to return.

I'm sure they look at markets all the time. If they think it will make sense, they'd do it. Notice I said "sense," not "money," because they have a finite number of aircraft with limited ability to get more. Just because they pulled out of a market doesn't mean the market didn't perform at all. It may have simply underperformed other markets.

It's much like when a retailer closes a store location. It may have been a busy or even profitable store. It just wasn't making as much money as the rest of the chain, that it brought down the chain's numbers, so to get the chain's numbers up to target, they close the store. Happens all the time.

gt1995

Oh, what I wouldn't give for United to be flying to PBI or FLL again. I have occassion to fly to PBI frequently and the lack of competition from the DC area is killing me.

USAirways is the only reliable solution. JetBlue (from IAD) isn't even flying their seasonal service to PBI anymore, and it appears that Southwest (from BWI) has recently gone from year-round to seasonal.

While USAirways has my most convenient route (DCA-PBI), I would definitely choose United from IAD over USAirways if they flew it. But, previous posts are correct that there is just not much business travel there. Even the United legs from IAD-MIA are largely connecting traffic to Latin America.

StingWest

You forgot Virgin America, which operates a convenient service from the west coast.

criddy123

I agree that service to PBI is lacking from the DC area. I am taking US this coming week DCA-PBI and would prefer to have UA offering some service on this route or from IAD.

Rel88

Guess it depends where you live in the region. I'm close to DCA and would rather go on US from DCA then trek to IAD for UA (when it might very well be on a CR7 if it existed). But I agree I'd love to see UA back in FLL. Think this thread will be enough pressure?

1bentley

As a CO fly I would love to have ORD and IAD back in FLL. CO has numerous flights to EWR, IAH, and a few to CLE. There is even a decent Presidents Club in FLL.

goalie

i'll see your "seemed to be pretty full" and raise it to "always full" as that was (prior to the pull out) the only way for me to get to goalie-parents' place in palm beach and yes, i would love to see pbi come back as it's so much easier for me (10 minutes vs "the schlep" to/from fll)

exerda

I'd say it might very well be on a CRJ-200 if it existed.

jchiguy1

Traveling ORD to South Florida at least twice a month I would be overjoyed to have any kind of expanded service to MIA/FLL/PBI. The E70's are almost always oversold and ORD-MIA is the only route where my UDU has not cleared. United please, please bring mainline service(other than Sat/Sun) back to MIA and give us at least one more co-terminal option.

bocastephen

For those airlines (like DL and CO) who can market their product effectively, the revenue mix is pretty balanced, specifically for FLL. PBI has strong yields, but pretty much during season...off season, they are weak. FLL has a lot of cruise traffic which dampens yields slightly, but there is enough higher yielding business traffic to balance things out.

There is a huge business community in the South Florida and Delta has owned the lion's share of its travel revenue for many years - CO, US and to a much smaller degree, AA have been tussling over the remainder.

UA FAILED to capitalize on this market and decided to quit, just like their failure in MIA. Frankly, IF this dreaded merger goes through I would like to see FLL-IAD and FLL-ORD nonstops added to compliment the IAH and EWR trips so I have more options to connect with the left coast. Connecting at IAH during the winter and ORD during the summer would minimize my weather disruption chances.

UpInTheSky

That probably tells you something about the economics of serving DC to PBI.