CF: AA Isn't as Weak in Asia As You Might Think

[MAH4546]

Given that AA already holds 50% of all US carrier frequencies between the US and GRU and will gain yet one more with the merger with US, it will take a COMPLETE absence of interest by every other carrier for AA to gain another frequency, which is highly unlikely to happen.

It gains nothing from the merger, because US only has a leased slot that will return to UA in, IIRC, 2014.

Furthermore, if AA ends up proposing the only West Coast-Brazil service on a U.S.-flagged carrier, it's not difficult to see why it has a very good chance.

 

[IORFA]

I think they both have a good chance to be awarded. Last long term? Nah. I think LAX will bomb as fast as it did for the worlds greatest airline bar none. I agree if anyone wants LA as well, we are the only one that MIGHT make it work. ORD is also likely as it is competition for UA. Not sure ORD makes sense either, but we might force UA off of it. Either way, I think one of them would be better off moved to DFW later after we lose money on it first. Twice daily DFW is convenient for anything west of the Mississippi. Also, we already have a great Asian connection through NRT to SA from DFW. The late NRT - DFW is perfect for that.

 

[NewHampshire Black Bears]

WT,
To the point(only) about AA being 'tested' once all things are equal in SA, AA will decimate Any and ALL(usa) competition into/from SA.
A good example of that would be..DL's imcompetance against AA in DFW !

 

[WorldTraveler]

so does that make AA incompetent in NYC since DL has pretty well decimated AA at LGA and JFK? Since E likes stats I could post a whole boatload of them about AA vs DL in NYC over the past 5 years. DL's decision to shut the DFW hub and move those assets to NYC could not have turned out any better. DL lost about 6 share points of local DFW share which is worth a few tens of millions of dollars in DFW but gained billions in new revenue in NYC. I'll also note that DL has already picked up more than 1/3 of the combined JFK/LGA - MIA market share in one of the largest domestic markets on AA's network. And DL isn't thru at MIA or DFW or NYC.

MAH,
if there were an abundance of slots at GRU and everyone could have as much as they wanted, there would be no argument that AA should be given the chance to try LAX-GRU and add ORD-GRU. But it doesn't change that there isn't an abundance of slots which is why there is a route case in progress. It also doesn't change the US DOT has had a longstanding policy of giving opportunities to carriers and markets that have the greatest potential to add new markets and new competition. KE operates LAX-GRU and they aren't going anywhere; even though the DOT doesn't consider what foreign carriers do WRT route selection for US carriers, KE has managed to pull a lot of traffic off of US carriers. It also doesn't change the fact that LAX is a small market compared to what hubs in the east can generate in new traffic to Brazil. And AA already has a sizable portion of the LAX-Brazil market now.
It also doesn't change that AA has over half of US carrier slots to GRU operating on its own metal, and yes, they will gain one more with the US merger. It is precisely because the US and Brazil are pushing towards Open Skies in the next couple years that there is little value to a frequency lease beyond 2014 - which is why US wasn't willing to pay for a frequency that will likely be available at no charge by the end of the lease. It also means that the clause in the DCA-LGA slot deal regarding GRU access is rather meaningless since the chances were always very slim that DL would have had to provide GRU access to US; with the merger, the risk is completely eliminated.
We can debate how the US-Brazil route case will be decided but neither you or I will make the decision.

AA's monopoly position in the MIA-Latin America market is coming to an end. As much as Bears wants to tout AA's track record, the evidence is obvious that NK now has 10% +/- of the DFW market at fares far larger than DL charges, AA's share of the LHR market dropped quickly after other carriers were given access to key routes including JFK and EWR to LHR, and most notable to this conversation, AA has yet to demonstrate that it an effectively compete in Asia against other carriers.

AA loses far more money trying to compete in Asia than other carriers lose against AA in Latin America, if they lose anything; in contrast to AA's performance to Asia, many average fares to deep S. America for AA's competitors are comparable to what AA gets on flights to Asia that are 3-4 hours longer and on which AA uses larger and heavier aircraft.

AA not only has yet to figure out how to compete effectively in Asia but they will face enormous new competition to markets in Latin America that have been closed to any other competitors for years.

 

[eolesen]

CGH has more flights and seats per day domestic for JJ than GRU.

When you add in the international operation, GRU is larger on both a flight and a seat basis, but that's skewed by the widebody operation.

G3 and JJ trade back and forth on who has more seats out of CGH.

Where GRU fails as a hub is the timings. They absolutely suck unless you like long sit times. JJ kicks out an average of 8 domestic departures an hour in the mornings, which is when the US flights arrive.

3+ hours wait for the first flight to CWB? Not for me, thanks.

45 minutes to Faria Lima, eh? I've been working with TAM since 2009, and flying to GRU regularly. I've yet to experience anything less than 70 minutes in a taxi. The worst was 3+ hours on a Friday night heading back out to GRU. The cab driver had to stop to pee.

 

[Mach85ER]

E,

But you had a "waterfront" view for most of the ride

 

[eolesen]

But you had a "waterfront" view for most of the ride

Yep, and seeing that after (or during) a rainstorm) gave me a pretty good idea of what the garbage whirlpool out in the Pacific Ocean is supposed to look like...

That's also the point at which I started packing a Katadyn water filter with me.

 

[WorldTraveler]

the "nice" thing about Brazil is dropping your pants is quite acceptable in most quarters.

3 hours is an exception based on traffic flow even in SP, though it is very possible that type of drive time happens a couple times per week.

3 hours is not much more than the standard connection for an inbound international flight in many countries.

Your expectations are clearly that Brazil should have departures every minute as you see at ORD and ATL and DFW and.... but Brazil's infrastructure doesn't support that. GRU is essentially a 1 runway for landing and 1 runway for departures operation while CGH is a one runway operation most of the time. That in part is why there are few non-mainline aircraft and the seating density on both JJ and G3 is higher than average for the same aircraft used in other parts of the world.

I hope it doesn't come as a shock to you but Brazil is not exactly known for the efficiency of its infrastructure... it is just part of life and people learn how to deal with it.

CGH is still the dominant DOMESTIC and preferred DOMESTIC airport for São Paulo because it is closer to most of the city of São Paulo, not unlike the relationship between DAL and DFW in the Dallas-Ft. Worth metroplex. As of right now, G3 is the largest airline at CGH while JJ is at GRU.

I'm sure AA's decision to operate flights from MIA to many destinations is driven precisely because US hub operations are more efficient than those in Brazil along with the fact that one way or another - partnerwise - AA will have a decent presence thru out Brazil. Their size in all of Latin America combined with Brazil's infrastructure constraints make it pretty unlikely that the US government would ever allow AA to have antitrust immunity and joint scheduling with a Brazilian airline unless Infraero (the airport operator for Brazil) manages to come up w/ a whole lot more slots for US carriers than exist now.

Finally, Brazilian Airlines do not operate true hub and spoke operations the way US airlines do. Many flights are multistep and transit one of the two airports in each of Rio, São Paulo, or Brasilia during the day. There are not many times of the day when the same airline has more than 12-15 flights per hour at any Brazilian airport. The capacity just doesn't exist to do that. ON top of that G3 and JJ have a habit of scheduling on top of each other and there just aren't the volume of flights or choices that exist in large hubs in the US or even Europe.

Brazil is a unique place and can be very maddening - but somehow 200 million people manage to get along pretty well down there.

Oh, and you can see raw sewage flowing into the ocean in Califórnia... don't even have to leave the US.

 

[MAH4546]

Given that AA already holds 50% of all US carrier frequencies between the US and GRU and will gain yet one more with the merger with US, it will take a COMPLETE absence of interest by every other carrier for AA to gain another frequency, which is highly unlikely to happen.

Looks like we have a complete absence of interest by every other carrier.

 

[WorldTraveler]

Looks like we have a complete absence of interest by every other carrier.

Perhaps we do…. Given that UA already leased a slot for GRU service to US and every other carrier has had the opportunity to add flights outside of GRU, the only question comes to when DL chooses to expand its service at GRU.
Other than that, AA is free to add as much capacity as it wants.
Given that KE’s DOT statistics between LAX-GRU show pretty weak load factors and that flight includes thru passengers from GRU to ICN, there may not be as much traffic to fill AA’s daily 777 as they think.

But I’m particularly glad that you reopened this topic since it provided an opportunity to do a little statistical analysis.
While E clearly salivated at the prospect of starting a new topic that would draw me into a fight with AA’s loyalists in an effort to rack up negative votes, the datapull shows that username Veritas was way out front in voting down as many of WT’s posts in this topic as possible. IN fact, I’m not sure Veritas missed any of them, but I’ll post his reputation page in case anyone wants to see not only if he/she/it missed any WT posts here to vote down – or for that matter has missed any of the last several thousand over the last couple years.
http://www.airlinefo...ser/56-veritas/
What should be very apparent is that Veritas is a very loyal AA employee – or wannabe – who seems to know all the HR kind of information about the company but also has an enormous grudge against WT.
Now I have no idea who Veritas is but he/she/it never participates in any of the discussions about strategic issues, being an HR kind of person.
Yet they have one royal beef against WT.
And strangely, EOlesen is hellbent on bringing up Spectator’s activity and is horribly preoccupied with activity to vote UP WT's reputation but acts totally unaware that Veritas was WT’s largest and primary negative voter.

But this isn't faith, and it isn't a hobby.

It's peoples' careers. It's people's second family.

I’m fully aware that people’s lives and careers are on the line and I have never made light of that.

No one else has taken my posts about AA as personally as you have.

No one else has worked as hard to silence the criticism of AA as you have.

It's about deflection. Instead of discussing the topic, WT would rather discuss anything else. And suddenly, Silver Meteor, who occasionally pops in to defend WT in the past, makes a surprise appearance?
As long as we're off-topic and deflecting, I do find it most curious that someone who rarely makes an appearance and says in their signature that they're an avid DL FF suddenly signed in, and decided to jump into this discussion... Posting within minutes of WT, then going away, and then posting within minutes of WT's next response... On a Wednesday, mid-morning...
Just sayin'.... on the internet, nobody knows you're a dog.

Yes, that’s right you never know who is using two accounts or manipulating the post voting system.

For years you have tried to paint the picture of Spectator as the one who was manipulating the post voting system yet Veritas’ name was never raised.
And yet when someone wants to jump into the conversation and affirm that perhaps I might have offered insight, you immediately attacked them.

You never have been capable of engaging in debate or discussion.

You don’t think a data driven kind of guy like me didn’t know where the negative votes were coming from?
You don’t think a data driven guy like me couldn’t add up the number of negative votes that came from other people and those that came from Veritas?
Let me remind you again that Veritas has over 430 pages of negative reputation votes (unless those somehow magically have disappeared) while posting having less than 1000 posts in 10 years on the forum.
I don’t know of any other user who has such a high ratio of reputation pages compared to actual posts - except of course Spectator.

Maybe the answer as to why Spectator exists is directly related to the presence of serial red button pushes, of whom Veritas would most certainly be the Prime Minister.

 

[eolesen]

Hellbent? Please. You seem awfully defensive today.

I'm just bringing up facts, and if facts make you defensive or uncomfortable, then perhaps you should reflect on why it makes you uncomfortable, instead of going after the people who bring them up.

And it's a fact YOU created a special secret user ID to up your own post count, got caught, and continue to use that fake account.

• Can you tell us why you feel entitled to two negative votes against someone's posts versus just one?
  
• Can you tell us why are feel entitled to vote for yourself, when the forum's rules don't allow you to vote for yourself?
  
• Can you tell us why it's unfair for Veritas or any other user to vote down your posts, yet OK for you to use a fake account to vote up your posts?

By the way, I know who Veritas is. He's been on these and other TW related forums for years.

And, no, I'm not Veritas, which I suspect you're trying to insinuate. The only user profiles I've used to participate, vote, or read these forums in the past seven years is this one.

You can verify that with the admins -- it's pretty easy to do an IP check.

 

[WorldTraveler]

I have simply pointed out that there is a username called Veritas that has voted down Spectator's posts by the THOUSANDS over a period of years and you, who have seemed so very interested in protecting the integrity of the post voting system seemed completely unaware of it.

Again, who is he/she/it and what beef do they have with WT that has stretched on for years, why do you who appear to be so concerned about WT's reputation not know about Veritas' activity, and why do you PERSONALLY - not Veritas seem so determined to shut down WT and any comments that he makes or anyone that supports him?

And what motivated you to all of a sudden throw in a discussion about the post voting system in the middle (actually pretty close to the beginning) of a discussion about AA's presence in Asia?

Is it possible that your primary motivation was to see how many negative votes you could get the mob to give WT, just as had happened just hours before with Fluf's post about AA attacking DL hubs?

You established a long time ago that you focus an enormous amount of attention on reputation while I have made it clear that I could care less about the post voting system since it is clearly so easily manipulated; we just happen to know that Spectator is not the only one manipulating the system - and in fact has spent far less time focused on trying to win against Veritas than Veritas has been against WT.

Of else Veritas is holding a grudge a mile wide.

 

[eolesen]

Sounds like someone needs an enema....

 

[eolesen]

I have simply pointed out that there is a username called Veritas that has voted down Spectator's posts by the THOUSANDS over a period of years and you, who have seemed so very interested in protecting the integrity of the post voting system seemed completely unaware of it.

Sounds like someone needs not only an enema, but better reading glasses.

Why would Veritas be voting down Spectator's posts? You don't post under that ID. You only vote with it.

I don't just believe in the integrity of the post voting system; I believe in integrity.


As for getting the mob whipped up to vote against you?

You do a good enough job of that thru your own words. Why would I need to help in that effort?

 

[WorldTraveler]

yes, you are right.

Veritas votes down WT's posts. By the thousands.

I'm not interested in the words... your actions speak far louder.

So far, I have yet to see a decent explanation as to who Veritas is and why he has had such a grudge against WT.

I can, however, see very clearly that you have an enormous grudge against WT.

I inferred nothing. I did very clearly say that it is beyond believable to think that you - someone who has posted the day to day movement in reputation scores - were unaware that Veritas was active as they were in WT's scores.

And it also doesn't change the question which Veritas has to answer as to why someone who paints themselves out to be an AA insider and who never participated in network/strategy discussions spent enormous amounts of time to vote down literally thousands of posts.

Sorry, it doesn't add up.