Some interesting changes have come about at LF.
Virgin was above 40K plus passengers flying out of LF at beginning of 2017. Once Alaska took over they have dropped dramatically since. During 2nd half of 2017 and all of 2018 Virgins flights have drooped to point of none by mid 2018 when Alaska started supplying main aircraft to take over the Virgin flights. However, shortly after the full Virgin take over, Alaska has continued to pull flights and a drp in passenger counts. By the end of 2018 and the start of 2019 Alaska pulled "all" main line flying out of LF. (Interesting) They now are subbing all LF flying out to Horizon and SkyWest Airlines. With about 10K passengers each the two commuter airlines with much smaller aircraft are barely keeping the 20K passengers down from the almost 45K by Virgin when they were flying.
Not so sure I would have subbed those flights out, especially with the smaller aircraft. Some, if not the majority passengers, will get sick and tired of the smaller aircraft with smaller and more crowded seats and overhead bin storage, and will in fact lose customers to other airlines at LF, especially with the baggage fees they charge when Southwest is still not charging for baggage unless overweight.
It also shows that Alaska is not fully utilizing their gates to the fullest and it is in writing that if you do not do so that you will/must accommodate other carriers. So maybe Delta should move over to sharing a gate with them until the final word comes down. Or, maybe, one of those two gates should go to Delta. THERE, all fixed
🙂
Court case will move on come May of this year, so this is very interesting action being taken by Alaska. Maybe they too will eventually pull out of LF as it is just too much to try and compete with Southwest at such a large Southwest base. It would be the same at Atlanta when someone would try and compete with Delta at Atlanta.
The beat goes on at LF over the gates. Amazing just how long that Delta has been able to squat on these gates...
https://www.yahoo.com/news/m/0d33ce66-f1c8-3c6a-a8b6-15cb11c6ddd5/why-alaska-airlines-is-flying.html
Here's just one of the many comments on flying smaller aircraft:
John,
1 hour ago,
"I had the displeasure to flying the E175 into and out of Love Field. This aircraft is great for short routes but long routes are terrible. And I flew first class as I was upgraded both ways. Brutal on my back."
