heritage planes

[AlabubbaRegional]

I wouldn't mind seeing it on a few hundred Southwest aircraft.

 

[BuffaloJoe]

They removed the HP PHL-PHX flight after 6pm and their HP PHL-LAS 8:15pm flight and put a US 757 on that flight. Now that they are becoming 1, why not put that 1:00pm PHL-PHX flight back. I can't see
7:00a
9:45a
9:50a
4:20p
5:45p
There is too much time in between 9:50a & 4:20p and they could do an night flight after 8pm.

 

[Travelpro72]

We have notoriously used small a/c in markets where a larger a/c could be justified. MCO for example has been that way for ages. 737-300's and 400's leaving right behind each other. We need more widebody's domestically now not in 2011. We would use Emb-170's to Munich if they thought it would make it. LOL

 

[MarkMyWords]

PA18 - unreal!...who's the competion here? hard to believe that after almost 4 months the company is not seeing this.

Well, when both flights are operating nearly full, why would you eliminate one? Between the 2 flights we offer over 260 seats in that time frame. What are you going to reeplace them with? The spare A330 we have just sitting around?

Once we are able to fully intigrate the schedules, I think you will see some better a/c utilization. Perhaps they could work something out where West airplanes and crew fly PHX-PHL-PVD and East crews fly PHL-PHX-SAN. Then you could operate PHL-PHX flights more evenly through the day.

 

[AstroLounge]

They removed the HP PHL-PHX flight after 6pm and their HP PHL-LAS 8:15pm flight and put a US 757 on that flight. Now that they are becoming 1, why not put that 1:00pm PHL-PHX flight back. I can't see
7:00a
9:45a
9:50a
4:20p
5:45p
There is too much time in between 9:50a & 4:20p and they could do an night flight after 8pm.

Hmmm, we need to give swa a Large enough window to beef up their schedule....add flights (at times that make sense) and eventually reduce OUR schedule, eventually serve it w/ONE R/T on a 319 before we decide to pull it completely....must be using the "old" playbook AGAIN! :down:

 

[MarkMyWords]

If US had a 1:00pm departure to PHX, the airplane would go out and RON in PHX. If the airplane were to trun back to PHL, it would get in after 11pm and would probably not carry as many people. Once we get closer to integrating, then you may see additional flying in the afternoon since you can use the airplane to fly past PHX to west cities....gaining productivity.

 

[Travelpro72]

I think it would be in the companies best interest to definately blend the schedules as mentioned above. If I remember correctly we did that after the PSA merger. You would fly an md-80 trip say PIT-MCI-LAX and then up and down the west coast until you flew back during what could be a 4-day trip. It would be more productive for the crews and the company. I bet that will happen fairly soon. Can't wait to overnight in Eugene, OR.... hey west, looking forward to SYR? LOL.....all the best.

 

[rjh]

it looks as if the heritage schemes will be painted on west a/c since there no east airbus a/c scheduled for paint in 2006. now i ask, shouldn't the east airbus a/c be painted in the peidmont ,allegheny,and psa schemes since most employees from these airlines are based in the east coast? i am sure that many pilots,f/a's,,mechanics,rampers and many general east employees would love to work or see one of these birds. i am even sure that employees in clt would love to see the peidmont plane fly in from time to time. but that won't happen since the former america west never served clt. now the america west heritage plane should stay on a west a/c but the others i think belong on east a/c. what do you guys think?

Just read in this weeks "About US" that they originally were going to use West A/C for all the retro liveries. But after hearing concerns, the Piedmont/PSA/Allegheny aircraft will now come from the East fleet.

It never occurred to them this would be a big deal; but once they heard it was, they changed their minds. Sounds to me like mgmt. again is doing what they can to listen to employees.

 

[laxtwin]

I wonder why PSA would come from the East fleet? I know they merged with US Air, but they flew in the West.

 

[etops1]

this was the question . and for the record, i was the one who submitted this question.


Q. From what I can tell, it appears that the heritage planes will all be coming from the US Airways West operation. I don’t mean to pick knits, but I think that the Allegheny, Piedmont and PSA heritage planes should come from the East operation since the majority of employees who came from these three airlines are working in the East operation. In fact, the Piedmont plane – if it comes from the West fleet – won’t even make it to Charlotte where the majority of Piedmont folks work, since West flights don’t fly to Charlotte. Of course, a West heritage aircraft should be painted on a plane from the West fleet. Just my two cents.

A. Initially, all of the heritage planes were going to be West aircraft. That was before anyone really gave it the kind of thought you’re bringing to the table with this question. Fortunately, these issues surfaced quickly and the current plan is as you suggest. The Allegheny, PSA and Piedmont heritage planes will come from aircraft under the East operating certificate. In fact, they’ll be East A319s. And, as you suggest, the America West heritage plane will come from the West operating certificate (formerly America West Airlines). Watch for news on the rollout of these special airplanes too!





i am very very happy with this response. it does look like management is realy listening to us .

 

[PA18]

Well, when both flights are operating nearly full, why would you eliminate one? Between the 2 flights we offer over 260 seats in that time frame. What are you going to reeplace them with? The spare A330 we have just sitting around?

As a matter of fact, they were both full on the occasions that I happened to be on one of them.

US East management has been bleating for years about "seat mile costs" and "labor costs" (excluding the cost of vice-presidents, which they have more of than Southwest, JetBlue, and AirTran combined). Here is a classic example. Two aircraft and two crews flying between the same city pairs within eight minutes of each other.

Talk about seat mile costs!

Where are all those 767's that aren't going to Europe this time of year? I'm sure they aren't all in maintenance.

It's winter. People from the northeast want to go where it's warm. The 767 from PHL to SJU is a good idea. Why not expand that thinking to other warm-weather markets -- like Florida, the Caribbean, the Southwest, and California -- seasonally?

US East regularly flies 757's on some of its hourly flights between BOS and PHL. Now there's a really efficient use of a long-range, almost-200-seat airplane. Other than LAS, I'll bet no US East 757 or 767 has been west of the Mississippi in five years.

Granted, the Sept. 27 merger closing date was too close to the big autumn schedule change. However, there seemed to be plenty of time to "synergize" by the February schedule change.

From what I've seen so far it would appear to be business as usual.

 

[MarkMyWords]

PA18

Once again you fail to congnize that there is demand there enough to fill two airplanes - 260 seats - daily. You want them to replace the two airplanes with one airplane that holds only 203 people. How is that logical? Now if demand in that time frame were less and one airplane (757 or 767) would be appropriate, then I would agree.

As for the 767 fleet...they currently operate 3 SJU trips, 2 STT trips and a CUN trip on the weekends as well as several CLT-PHL and PHL-CLT (full) trips to move airplanes in/out of mtc. During the week, we operate 3 round trips to SJU, 1 to STT and 1 to CUN and well as the full CLT-PHL-CLT trips.

So you would advocate reducing available seats PHL-PHX by 22% so that we could only run one full flight instead of two? What full trips on the 767 would you reduce seat capacity by 40% when you downgrade the equipment form a 767 to an A319?

 

[700UW]

Plus there is no spare A330, the A330 originates in PHL and on the RON it undergoes required ETOPS maintenance, then it goes PHL-SJU-PHL-LGW, it carries a large volume of cargo in and out of SJU, that is why it is run there.

 

[BoeingBoy]

Mark,

I think PA18's point is that it's inefficient to fly two smaller airplanes within minutes of each other between the same cities rather than a single bigger airplane, and he's right. This is merely one component of the inefficiency that's been used as a reason to beat concessions from the employees.

You're also right - we don't have the number of bigger planes to cover all the flying that we could use them for if we had them. So to do what PA18 suggests would be robbing Peter to pay Paul.

So we "make do" with what we have, and pay a price for it.

Jim

 

[Paul]

<snip> So to do what PA18 suggests would be robbing Peter to pay Paul.

</snip>

Oh goodie, just when the X-mas bills are coming in too.