DL expands SEA further with SEA-SFO flights

[WorldTraveler]

DL has no 737 crews based in SEA.
 
Not overwater.  Not any.
 
Remember that DL's intention was for SEA to be an int'l gateway while AS would provide the domestic feed outside of DL's hubs.
 
Since AS wasn't interested in that role, DL is adding its own domestic feed.  the crews will follow
 
The 757 is common rated with the 767 and DL does have 757/767 crews at SEA. 
 
The 757 is a larger aircraft and is more capable than a 737 in every respect.  The only difference between the 757 and a 737 is that the 757 costs more to operate - which should say how confident that DL is regarding the route. 
 
JNU is a port of call for many cruise ships. 
Wal Mart has nothing to do with anything. 
 
AS sends multiple  737s per day to JNU in the summer. 
 
I'm sure DL's single 757 is just a means by which DL will get a share of a market which is VERY premium priced. 
 
Perhaps next summer DL will add JNU - ANC since that is a high demand market as well.
 
Western had a great network in Alaska.  NW BUILT ANC airport.  DL's west coast network would look great topped by a string of cities up and down Alaska. 
 
Maybe DL will christen a Salmon Fifty Salmon.

 

[eolesen]

Sure, JNU is a port of call. That means the ship docks, they shop, the ship leaves. They're embarking or disembarking 150 people a day. A handful of passengers will leave the ship mid cruise on any given day due to medical or emergency reasons, and there might be a couple crew members who leave/join, but it's again a very small number.

Walmart is an easy benchmark for anyone to use to gauge the size of a local market. Walmart goes where the money is. They open up multiple 24 hour stores when there's a large market, and they don't stay open as long in low population areas.



So are hotel rooms.

Doing a quick search against the GDS, there are less than 2000 rooms (@~25 hotels) listed for the area. I'm sure there are some boutique hotels and B&B's which aren't in the GDS, but it's not going to add significantly to the number of room nights available for tourism.

Unless you can come up with something a little more concrete to point to what would drive the demand, it's clearly not a market driven decision to assign a 757.

 

[WorldTraveler]

AS has about 850 seats per day scheduled between JNU and SEA this July.
 
DL's 757 represents less than 20% of the total capacity of the JNU to lower 48 market. 
 
AS has about an equal amount of capacity to other Alaskan cities..
 
Wal-Mart isn't going to put stores in a city that peaks for 3 months per year.... and I'm not sure Alaskans want any Wal-Mart's ugly stores any more than necessary. 

 

[eolesen]

I suspect AS has the state contracts, and they're also taking a lot of fish in the belly, again under contract.

Walmart's stores may be ugly to you, but for people on a limited income, they're a Godsend.

 

[WorldTraveler]

If DL didn't think they could money flying the routes, they wouldn't be trying.
 
DL didn't become the world's most profitable airline by engaging in childish shoving matches that hurt the bottom line.
 
DL is doing what it is doing because there is money to be made and DL is not afraid of competing in many markets in the US it can.

Yes, I know what Wal-Mart is capable of doing but there are plenty of people who seek other options and support other merchants when they can. 

 

[metopower]

738 doesn't have the performance of the superior 757. SEA is a 757/767 crew base. Small number of pilots will need to be qualified into JNU. All DL aircraft are overwater qualified but some are not ETOPS .757 can carry much more cargo and pax out of JNU .Have no idea what Walmart has to do with this.

 

[AdAstraPerAspera]

I'm not feeling your Wal-Mart metric, E... after all, the largest and most important city in the country has zero Wal-Marts, 24 hour or otherwise... I agree with your broader point, though.

 

[WorldTraveler]

I'm so glad you pointed that out. I was just waiting to ask E how that metric works not just in NYC but in some of the largest metro regions in the country.

Apparently the Wal-mart meter is disproportionately skewed to southern, medium and smaller size cities.

Not sure what broader point you are trying to agree with.

AS has 6 flights/day SEA-JNU with 850 seats and you and/or E think DL isn't capable of making 1 757 flight/day work?

You do realize that DL as a result of both the Western and Northwest mergers has a deep history in Alaska and is the largest airline to the lower 48 if you exclude SEA, including the new flights that DL is adding?

The reason why DL and AS made such good partners was because DL's Alaska route system complemented AS' so perfectly.

But given that AS wasn't interested in doing what DL needed, DL is now on track to overlap AS' top routes and end up with 1/3 of the capacity to Alaska that AS has - and DL still has a token presence in SEA-JNU/ANC/FAI.

I have a feeling that there will be more Alaska cities and more frequencies in the ones DL does serve over the next few years.

 

[AdAstraPerAspera]

I agree with his broader point that the 757 on that routing is likely out of operational necessity, not demand.

Fantastic news for JNU commuters/nonrevvers, though

 

[Kev3188]

+1

I think there are likely a lot of reasons for the switch, very few of which are any kind of exciting.

Any/none/all of these may in play:

Superior performance of the '57

Maybe all the 738 flying has been otherwise booked for the season

Slack in the '57 flying

Extant base in SEA makes for easier routing & training both.

And so on and such forth...

But if DL can make a little extra revenue, then it's all the better.

 

[WorldTraveler]

I agree with his broader point that the 757 on that routing is likely out of operational necessity, not demand.

Fantastic news for JNU commuters/nonrevvers, though

no one said that demand WASN'T a part of the factor except those who want to paint DL's SEA-Alaska service as an uneconomic aggression on DL's part.

again, AS will operate SIX flights per day with 850 seats/day SEA-JNU. The demand far exceeds what DL is offering. Considering that DL will offer 21% of all of the seats between Alaska and the lower 48 this summer, DL's presence in SEA-JNU (their only service to JNU) is BELOW their share of the total Alaska market.

Kev,
DL intends to not make a little money. They intend to make LOTS of it. It's kinda great when they have their world's largest profit in 2013 as a goal to surpass and I'm just gonna bet their gonna do it, to the benefit of all DL stakeholders.

It'll look rather cool as the AS personnel and passengers have to LOOK UP to DL's 757.

I hope there are some DL photogs ready to post pics of DL's 757s zig zagging their way thru southern AK, on the ramp at JNU, and taking off like bats out of you-know-where on their way out of town.

BTW, those who are making such a hoopla about the 757 at JNU might do well to note that DL uses the 757 to/from ANC and FAI and has for a number of years.

 

[Kev3188]

Pretty sure it's you & you alone who is trying to make "hoopla" out of it. The rest of the posts in this tangent seem to reflect the idea that it's simply a change in equipment, and one that is being made for any number of fairly banal reasons...

 

[WorldTraveler]

uh, no. here is my original post on the subject... with a question for Meto.

looks like the SEA-JNU flight for the summer has been upgraded to a 757


Delta 2579 Seattle (SEA) 7:45pm Juneau (JNU) 9:13pm Boeing 757-200 2hrs 28min 907 miles

Could be that DL has a 75/767 base in SEA but not a 737 base. DL pilots say that AS has not shared its approach info with DL; not sure what the technical differences are between the 757 and 737 regarding navigation (Meto or other pilots can jump in but the 757 is a high performance aircraft for exactly flights like SEA-JNU.

and of course the 757 has more seats.

two pages later, we have had Wal-Mart theories that only work in some cities, we have had conjecture about a shortage in DL's fleet, and we have had attempts to deny that DL really might have made a sound ECONOMIC decision.

Notice again that DL sends MULTIPLE 757s per day to ANC and FAI in the summer. It is really not that foreign of a concept.

DL offers more than 20% of the seats between Alaska and the lower 48 and they don't even have serve some of the cities that AS serves nonstop from the lower 48.

Regardless of the reason, which a host of people on here have tried to answer, including you, DL's track record says they are upgrading the flight because they can make money.

That is the SOLE reason that Delta Air Lines exists.

 

[AdAstraPerAspera]

The reason Delta Air Lines exists is because there were some crops in Bibb County that needed dusting.

 

[Kev3188]

It is really not that foreign of a concept.

That's right, it's not, hence most of the posts being fairly blase.

Why you keep trying to frame this as a sort of revolution in commercial aviation is beyond me...