First Response To Wn In Pit?

[BoeingBoy]

The official announcement on initial WN cities from PIT is on Thursday, but there's this speculation in the PIT paper:

Airline eyes five cities

Jim

 

[a320av8r]

Since U has only 221 flights per day to 68 destinations, I guess the prudent thing to do is trash them since WN will have 14 flights per day to 5 destinations.
Makes sense to me :blink: .

 

[Prince of PAWOBs]

Sigh,

As usual, any news is bad news to some of you around here.

Guess you would rather we not have the route, or any route structure at all I guess...

[post="248059"][/post]​

I'd be happy with a route structure. When it happens, I'll smile and be positive about it.

 

[700UW]

You reap what you sew!

And if you can't fathom that US did the city of Pittsburgh wrong with the last minute bankruptcy filings that rejected all the leases and the fact the US wanted that airport built, then you will never get it.

And your flight information is not correct either:

Daily Departures
US Airways 69

US Airways Express
159

Total
228

Scope of Pittsburgh Operation

US Airways and US Airways Express fly to 63 destinations nonstop each business day, the most of any carrier at Pittsburgh

 

[a320av8r]

Well, PIT NEEDED a new terminal- the old one was a rat hole. At that time, your management (Eddie and the boys) wanted it. Things have changed, we are still serving PIT with 221 flights per day which is more than most towns that size. But at least they still have service. Now there'll be plenty of flights to Philly and Wally World. Oh Boy!

 

[Prince of PAWOBs]

You reap what you sew!

And if you can't fathom that US did the city of Pittsburgh wrong with the last minute bankruptcy filings that rejected all the leases and the fact the US wanted that airport built, then you will never get it.

[post="248222"][/post]​

I'm with 700UW on this 100%. When US dumped their leases on the gates, they opened the door for this to happen. And it's not just WN that they need to be concerned with right now in PIT. Any airline can come in, work out a signatory agreement with the ACAA for gates and squeeze US into an even smaller area.

Anyone who says this isn't US's fault is smoking banana peels.

 

[700UW]

Interesting you make fun of WN by syaing you can fly to wally world, yet they have been the most profitible airline for the past 30 years and their employees are the highest paid of any airline in the United States and US is a joke of an airline with a management team that only knows how to take from the employees rather then actually run an airline.

And like I said it is 228 flights to 61 cities, try and get it right next time.

 

[MrAeroMan]

The fact is the airport they built didn't have to be a Taj Mahal. They could've gotten a lot cheaper building with the same functionality if they didn't try to "one up" the last airport that was built. PIT was in desperate need of a new facility and UAIR wasn't the only carrier that felt that way. They just got to write the biggest check because they were the biggest carrier and someone had to cover the Airport Authorities big ego at work.

 

[funguy2]

Business Week Article

Take a look at the "Gaining Altitude" chart of stage-length adjusted CASM that's linked under "Related Items".

Great link Boeing Boy... What I find particularly interesting is JetBlue's stage adjusted CASM being so close to America West's... That surprised me... I had seen other reports which suggested jetBlue's CASM, stage adjusted, was similar to Southwest's... Maybe, since jetBlue operates primarily long haul (their average stage length is 1300 miles compared to LUV at 575 and even HP at 1000 or so), maybe the relationship is not reciprocal...

That is, jetBlue's CASM is close to Southwest's at 1300miles (which according to a Unisys Scorecard it was... Southwest at 1300miles was under 6 cent CASM, and jetBlue was just under 6cents)... It does not seem rational that when adjusted the other way, that there is such a big difference... Maybe it is rational... I don't know... I really don't know the math behind stage adjusted CASM (although if some one does, please share it!), but it doesn't seem like there should be a huge difference. The only possible explanation is that the shorter stage length may magnify the difference at an exponential rate?

At any rate, I thought jetBlue's stage adjusted CASM per that link was the most interesting...

 

[BoeingBoy]

funguy,

The only explaination I can guess at is that someone else did the Business Week stage length adjustments and their method about doubled the size of the adjustment vs Unisys.

Jim

 

[mweiss]

A stage-length adjusted CASM is derived from a formula involving

• One constant (the average CASM at cruising altitude)
• One variable, consisting of departure-related constants (e.g., ground crew, extra time, labor, and fuel associated with climbing to and descending from cruise), divided by the number of miles in the stage.

The first element would appear as a horizontal line on the stage-length CASM chart. The second would appear as an asymptotic inverse-function curve, with a trend to infinity as stage-length approaches zero, and a trend to zero as stage-length approaches infinity. When you combine the two together, you get the asymptotic inverse-function curve, shifted up by the value obtained from the first element.

The big problem is figuring out the two values based on numbers that are not known outside small circles within the airlines (if they're even known within those circles). They have to be divined from lots of data taken from lots of sources. They're not precise when determined this way.

 

[SVQLBA]

A stage-length adjusted CASM is derived from a formula involving

• One constant (the average CASM at cruising altitude)
  
• One variable, consisting of departure-related constants (e.g., ground crew, extra time, labor, and fuel associated with climbing to and descending from cruise), divided by the number of miles in the stage.

The first element would appear as a horizontal line on the stage-length CASM chart. The second would appear as an asymptotic inverse-function curve, with a trend to infinity as stage-length approaches zero, and a trend to zero as stage-length approaches infinity. When you combine the two together, you get the asymptotic inverse-function curve, shifted up by the value obtained from the first element.

The big problem is figuring out the two values based on numbers that are not known outside small circles within the airlines (if they're even known within those circles). They have to be divined from lots of data taken from lots of sources. They're not precise when determined this way.

[post="248267"][/post]​

... or, more simply, just plot out CASM on the y axis against stage length on the X for your favorite carriers. You will see two distinct curves emerge, one for the LCCs (Southwest, Air Tran, B6) and one for the lgeacies. When you do this (and especially if you go back for several quarters) you will see that the legacies have not managed to put a significant dent in the CASM gap (at their stage length) to the LCC line. The gap is about 2c/ASM at 1300 miles and almost 4c/ASM at 500 miles.

The inability of any of the legacies to find a way of making a dent in the gap (not necessarily close it) is depressing, though the Q4 figures for DL (discussed in another thread) suggest they just may be starting to make some progress. For the rest of the legacies, stage length differences seem to drive all of the reported CASM differences.

 

[mweiss]

... or, more simply, just plot out CASM on the y axis against stage length on the X for your favorite carriers.

[post="248280"][/post]​

You can do that, but the results will be slightly misleading. The problem is that we don't know the precise values of the two constants (CASM at cruise, and fixed costs per departure). An airline with a higher seat-mile cost but lower departure cost would potentially have the same systemwide CASM as an airline with a lower seat-mile cost but higher departure cost. Without knowing the specifics, one could erroneously conclude that increased stage length would reduce CASM significantly.

 

[US1YFARE]

A post from the WN board says unofficial schedule is four flights a day to PHL and four flights from PHL. Airtran couldn't do it--I wonder how WN will do?

 

[jcavinato]

Leet's see: a 737 or a commuter jet? With the size of the cabin and vast differences in the padding of the seat, I'd pick a 737 any day. One thing that passengers gripe about in the commuter jets is the smaller size of the seats, the pitch, smaller area at your feat, and the lack of padding in the seat bottom. After an hour it's like sitting on one of those old wooden folding chairs.