csomo asked, I'm asking all of these questions because I'm just curious since I fly UA (and occasionally ACA) from IAD fairly often. My most recent trip on ACA was an IAD-LGA round trip in early August where the morning northbound CRJ trip was about a half-hour late but the late afternoon CRJ return to IAD was on-time. So my limited experience was mixed. Any insight you can provide would be appreciated.
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Cosmo,
I ride ACA about 8 times a month for my commute to IAD. On average I see about 1 in 8 being on-time. Operationaly ACA is challenged due to what appears to be communication and lack of airframe issues. On the airframe side they do not have the DO328 jets that they were anticipating thus forcing them to continue to fly the J-41 that is an inferior product to just about any form of civilized transportation.
On the communication issue I can only add to what happened just this evening. I was attempting to commute during the 5pm bank of depts. from IAD. ( by the way I would say this is the worse time to attempt travel on ACA) The gate I was departing from had 4 flights scheduled to depart around 5pm. Of those four flights all of them were delayed while our maintenance technicans attend to issues with your plane. After we boarded we were told by the Capt. that I flight was delayed because no flight attendant was available for the flight and one was called to our flight at the last minute. This is the type of communication issues that are the most frustrating as a UAL employee. Our domestic flying has been handed to ACA and they are not putting forth a very polished product. At the IAD terminal ACA has a variety of dialects that are announcing flights and the ability to discern your departure can require the skills of a interpeter for the UN at times.
Once underway I have to say the flight attendants do a very good job of tending to the pax. The ACA product definitely could use some tweaking, but if Tilton is really serious about restarting the shuttle at UAL then maybe we will see some mainline jets back into some of the markets we left in the past couple of years.
IMO, the ideal use of the RJ is to supplement mainline service for the thin flying. However, right now cost is everything and UAL is paying a very high price for the ability to have ACA fly OUR routes.
For Farely, UAL would not be firing anyone if we were to restart OUR routes. As long as the code in the computer says UA it is fair game for UAL. If and when we start using the DH code for the UAL flights then I would agree to your argument that we should heed the desires of ACA for our flying.
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Cosmo,
I ride ACA about 8 times a month for my commute to IAD. On average I see about 1 in 8 being on-time. Operationaly ACA is challenged due to what appears to be communication and lack of airframe issues. On the airframe side they do not have the DO328 jets that they were anticipating thus forcing them to continue to fly the J-41 that is an inferior product to just about any form of civilized transportation.
On the communication issue I can only add to what happened just this evening. I was attempting to commute during the 5pm bank of depts. from IAD. ( by the way I would say this is the worse time to attempt travel on ACA) The gate I was departing from had 4 flights scheduled to depart around 5pm. Of those four flights all of them were delayed while our maintenance technicans attend to issues with your plane. After we boarded we were told by the Capt. that I flight was delayed because no flight attendant was available for the flight and one was called to our flight at the last minute. This is the type of communication issues that are the most frustrating as a UAL employee. Our domestic flying has been handed to ACA and they are not putting forth a very polished product. At the IAD terminal ACA has a variety of dialects that are announcing flights and the ability to discern your departure can require the skills of a interpeter for the UN at times.
Once underway I have to say the flight attendants do a very good job of tending to the pax. The ACA product definitely could use some tweaking, but if Tilton is really serious about restarting the shuttle at UAL then maybe we will see some mainline jets back into some of the markets we left in the past couple of years.
IMO, the ideal use of the RJ is to supplement mainline service for the thin flying. However, right now cost is everything and UAL is paying a very high price for the ability to have ACA fly OUR routes.
For Farely, UAL would not be firing anyone if we were to restart OUR routes. As long as the code in the computer says UA it is fair game for UAL. If and when we start using the DH code for the UAL flights then I would agree to your argument that we should heed the desires of ACA for our flying.
Cosmo
Veteran
- Aug 20, 2002
- 840
- 0
Magsau:
Thanks for the reply and your insight. But if you will indulge me, your comments lead to 2 more questions:
1.) Are the ACA operational problems at IAD generally limited to the J41 or do they affect the CRJ flights also?
2.) Do these problems also exist with ACA's operations at ORD where the carrier flies only CRJs?
Hopefully, ACA's operations at IAD will improve over the next 18 months as the remaining J41s are replaced by additional CRJs, although that alone won't necessarily address personnel and procedures issues.
And I agree with you that if a United shuttle operation starts at IAD, some current ACA and Air Wisconsin routes should revert to UA mainline (like LGA and ATL, respectively), assuming traffic and yields can again support it. And BOS, still a mainline route, would probably be another good shuttle candidate route.
Thanks for the reply and your insight. But if you will indulge me, your comments lead to 2 more questions:
1.) Are the ACA operational problems at IAD generally limited to the J41 or do they affect the CRJ flights also?
2.) Do these problems also exist with ACA's operations at ORD where the carrier flies only CRJs?
Hopefully, ACA's operations at IAD will improve over the next 18 months as the remaining J41s are replaced by additional CRJs, although that alone won't necessarily address personnel and procedures issues.
And I agree with you that if a United shuttle operation starts at IAD, some current ACA and Air Wisconsin routes should revert to UA mainline (like LGA and ATL, respectively), assuming traffic and yields can again support it. And BOS, still a mainline route, would probably be another good shuttle candidate route.
cosmo,
To answer your questions. As to whether the problems are limited to the j-41 or RJ I can only say that I see pretty even amount of delays. My commute city is served by 2 J-41's and 2 CRJ's a day. One thing I find is that due to the lack of airframes the 2 CRJ's that are scheduled in our market are often replaced by the J-41. With the current pay for dept scheme the on-time factor is not a major player for ACA. Their just is no incentive for them under the current market conditions to do any better. Yesterday when I was waiting for my commute the agents were announcing flight by flight at my gate that were dealyed for technical reason. The dialect was very hard to decipher and all announcments were followed by the we apologize for any inconvenience this may cause you By the time the 4th flight was delayed the natives were definitely restless and started the what kinda operation is this? commentary to me. Having just finished a trip and being in a uniform makes me fair game for the pax to vent their frustrations to. They do not understand that this is not a UAL airplane and those agents are not UAL agents and why on earth would UAL allow something like this to happen. This is not one isolated instance this happens 4 out of 4 times I have commuted in OCT. My flights home are always during the 5pm bank and I do think that is worse than any other time to try to ride ACA. On the times that I have had to spend the night and take the first flight home in the AM it does not seem to be as bad.
As to your question about ORD. I can only say that of my friends that commute from my home station to ORD (we lost mainline service last Nov) they have an extremely hard time. The loads in the ORD market seem to be heavier than IAD so that is a major factor. The weather and flow control issues in ORD also have an impact and then factor in the gate and other operational issues that ACA is dealing with. Make ORD, from what I hear, a little worse. I have only tried to ride ACA out of ORD once. I have to say the end of the F-concourse took on a bit of tent city look with people sitting on the floors and hugging the walls. Just too many people in a small area. I have heard that ACA is going to start a busing type operation, similar to the old B-ramp at IAD, in ORD.
I do not mean to condem ACA as an airline just that they are suffering from many of the same problems they have since the acquistion of the the ARW DHC-8's in 1993. There is tremendous potential and given the right focus I think ACA would be the premier regional carrier for any airline it shared its code with. As a commuter I often find myself riding CMR to get to IAD and with similar operations to ACA I personally feel they have gotten it right. Not sure if that is just CMR or if DAL has better QC over their partner airlines.
Anyway that is enough of my drivel. Take care.
To answer your questions. As to whether the problems are limited to the j-41 or RJ I can only say that I see pretty even amount of delays. My commute city is served by 2 J-41's and 2 CRJ's a day. One thing I find is that due to the lack of airframes the 2 CRJ's that are scheduled in our market are often replaced by the J-41. With the current pay for dept scheme the on-time factor is not a major player for ACA. Their just is no incentive for them under the current market conditions to do any better. Yesterday when I was waiting for my commute the agents were announcing flight by flight at my gate that were dealyed for technical reason. The dialect was very hard to decipher and all announcments were followed by the we apologize for any inconvenience this may cause you By the time the 4th flight was delayed the natives were definitely restless and started the what kinda operation is this? commentary to me. Having just finished a trip and being in a uniform makes me fair game for the pax to vent their frustrations to. They do not understand that this is not a UAL airplane and those agents are not UAL agents and why on earth would UAL allow something like this to happen. This is not one isolated instance this happens 4 out of 4 times I have commuted in OCT. My flights home are always during the 5pm bank and I do think that is worse than any other time to try to ride ACA. On the times that I have had to spend the night and take the first flight home in the AM it does not seem to be as bad.
As to your question about ORD. I can only say that of my friends that commute from my home station to ORD (we lost mainline service last Nov) they have an extremely hard time. The loads in the ORD market seem to be heavier than IAD so that is a major factor. The weather and flow control issues in ORD also have an impact and then factor in the gate and other operational issues that ACA is dealing with. Make ORD, from what I hear, a little worse. I have only tried to ride ACA out of ORD once. I have to say the end of the F-concourse took on a bit of tent city look with people sitting on the floors and hugging the walls. Just too many people in a small area. I have heard that ACA is going to start a busing type operation, similar to the old B-ramp at IAD, in ORD.
I do not mean to condem ACA as an airline just that they are suffering from many of the same problems they have since the acquistion of the the ARW DHC-8's in 1993. There is tremendous potential and given the right focus I think ACA would be the premier regional carrier for any airline it shared its code with. As a commuter I often find myself riding CMR to get to IAD and with similar operations to ACA I personally feel they have gotten it right. Not sure if that is just CMR or if DAL has better QC over their partner airlines.
Anyway that is enough of my drivel. Take care.
Magsau
I agree that UAL owns the flying. It's just the arrogance that is exhibited when someone says, essentially, let's just take over the RJ's. That's different, and although it could probably be done, it wouldn't be all that kosher.
As to the constant anecdotal stuff like [one in eight flights are on time], why not post some actual operating numbers to back that up. I don't believe that your numbers are correct. I know that ACA has difficulties at times, but do you need to make a hobby out of pointing them out? Pretty bad form for someone who commutes on them (in my humble opinion as a commuter). I commute on them, and I think they are a great group of people working under difficult conditions. As to the slam on peoples english skills, we live in a multicultural society. I can't say much else on that topic.
See you at the A gates.
I agree that UAL owns the flying. It's just the arrogance that is exhibited when someone says, essentially, let's just take over the RJ's. That's different, and although it could probably be done, it wouldn't be all that kosher.
As to the constant anecdotal stuff like [one in eight flights are on time], why not post some actual operating numbers to back that up. I don't believe that your numbers are correct. I know that ACA has difficulties at times, but do you need to make a hobby out of pointing them out? Pretty bad form for someone who commutes on them (in my humble opinion as a commuter). I commute on them, and I think they are a great group of people working under difficult conditions. As to the slam on peoples english skills, we live in a multicultural society. I can't say much else on that topic.
See you at the A gates.
FrugalFlyer
Senior
- Aug 20, 2002
- 254
- 0
If operating RJs is so costly then why the RJ craze? It just doesn't look like a good business strategy. Why not just order and operate turbo props (Q200/300/400) at a profit? Is it not better to be a profitable #2 in a given market with turboprops? Just because one airline is operating RJs does it mean and everybody has to? To me a phrase like 'the majority of our customers prefer RJ' is not a good enough reason to operate RJs if it is going to be so costly and maybe unprofitable.
Farley,
UAL has a history of eating its own as it applies to Express carriers. MESA, ARW, WestAir, NPA etc. I feel for the jobs of any carrier. However the key is that my alliances lay with UAL. I want the best for UAL much like you would want it for your employer.
The configuration at IAD on the A-gates has 16 flights in close proximity. (4 at each podium, two podiums and the same set up just across the hallway for sixteen) With 2 RJ's on each end of the pier and 4 j-41 that is around 216 per each side of the hallway. (432 on sixteen flights). Trying to sort out all of these people onto 8 airplanes is a daunting task to say the least.
I am glad that you do not have the same experiences that I have had. Perhaps I need to hang with you in the terminal for some good karma. Unfortunately I spend alot of time waiting for delayed and oversold flights so the picture I see is quite different than the one you portray. With the other commuters I travel with they also seem to have similar experiences. Also, I believe the operational stats that ACA show are proof enough that you do not need my two cents to establish that work needs to be done on the product of United Express.
Once again I do not blame the crews at ACA. If anything the oversight of UAL has been lacking and allowed this problem to get worse. With any luck all of these issues will be resolved in due time and we can see more joint flying as opposed to the mass pullouts of recent. In fact I just noticed we are flying the B757 in the LGA-IAD market in December and our Sr. VP of Flight Ops said we are adding around 200 flights around the Thanksgiving holiday to accomodate demand. Perhaps there will be soft landing out there somewhere.
UAL has a history of eating its own as it applies to Express carriers. MESA, ARW, WestAir, NPA etc. I feel for the jobs of any carrier. However the key is that my alliances lay with UAL. I want the best for UAL much like you would want it for your employer.
The configuration at IAD on the A-gates has 16 flights in close proximity. (4 at each podium, two podiums and the same set up just across the hallway for sixteen) With 2 RJ's on each end of the pier and 4 j-41 that is around 216 per each side of the hallway. (432 on sixteen flights). Trying to sort out all of these people onto 8 airplanes is a daunting task to say the least.
I am glad that you do not have the same experiences that I have had. Perhaps I need to hang with you in the terminal for some good karma. Unfortunately I spend alot of time waiting for delayed and oversold flights so the picture I see is quite different than the one you portray. With the other commuters I travel with they also seem to have similar experiences. Also, I believe the operational stats that ACA show are proof enough that you do not need my two cents to establish that work needs to be done on the product of United Express.
Once again I do not blame the crews at ACA. If anything the oversight of UAL has been lacking and allowed this problem to get worse. With any luck all of these issues will be resolved in due time and we can see more joint flying as opposed to the mass pullouts of recent. In fact I just noticed we are flying the B757 in the LGA-IAD market in December and our Sr. VP of Flight Ops said we are adding around 200 flights around the Thanksgiving holiday to accomodate demand. Perhaps there will be soft landing out there somewhere.
There is more than salary involved in UAL operating RJs. First you gotta get a loan to buy em (if thats possible now), then you need spares, then you need parts,a maintenance base, then you need sims, PIs, etc. All this needs to be factored in when you decide to add another fleet. We just simplified the fleet and reduced future training costs so adding another fleet will just exacerbate the cash outflow. If indeed buying a 50/70 seat RJ becomes a viable option, then we probably need to dump the guppies or busses. The fewer fleets, the lower the training costs and all the associated stuff that goes with a new fleet.
will fix for food
Veteran
- Aug 20, 2002
- 664
- 50
[blockquote]
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On 11/2/2002 1
51 PM FrugalFlyer wrote:
If operating RJs is so costly then why the RJ craze? It just doesn't look like a good business strategy. Why not just order and operate turbo props (Q200/300/400) at a profit? Is it not better to be a profitable #2 in a given market with turboprops? Just because one airline is operating RJs does it mean and everybody has to? To me a phrase like 'the majority of our customers prefer RJ' is not a good enough reason to operate RJs if it is going to be so costly and maybe unprofitable.
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/blockquote]
The average passenger is afraid to see their plane swinging a prop. As wrong as it may be, they think they are dangerous and will fly whoever has the jet if they have a choice.
BTW, I have seen figures that compare expenses/ASM between ATR/s and ERJ/s flying for the same airline out of the same hub at the same time and the ATR/s were more expensive to fly. The ATR/s were in the area of 37 cents/ASM and the ERJ/s were around 21.
----------------
On 11/2/2002 1
51 PM FrugalFlyer wrote: If operating RJs is so costly then why the RJ craze? It just doesn't look like a good business strategy. Why not just order and operate turbo props (Q200/300/400) at a profit? Is it not better to be a profitable #2 in a given market with turboprops? Just because one airline is operating RJs does it mean and everybody has to? To me a phrase like 'the majority of our customers prefer RJ' is not a good enough reason to operate RJs if it is going to be so costly and maybe unprofitable.
----------------
/blockquote]
The average passenger is afraid to see their plane swinging a prop. As wrong as it may be, they think they are dangerous and will fly whoever has the jet if they have a choice.
BTW, I have seen figures that compare expenses/ASM between ATR/s and ERJ/s flying for the same airline out of the same hub at the same time and the ATR/s were more expensive to fly. The ATR/s were in the area of 37 cents/ASM and the ERJ/s were around 21.
Cosmo
Veteran
- Aug 20, 2002
- 840
- 0
Magsau:
Thanks for your second reply to my questions. As a passenger that is a moderately frequent user of United (and to a lesser extent ACA) flights at IAD, I appreciate the discussion of these operational issues since it gives me a better understanding of how my favorite airline works. I'll stop bugging you now and let you concentrate on your flying!
Thanks for your second reply to my questions. As a passenger that is a moderately frequent user of United (and to a lesser extent ACA) flights at IAD, I appreciate the discussion of these operational issues since it gives me a better understanding of how my favorite airline works. I'll stop bugging you now and let you concentrate on your flying!
Magsau,
yes you should hang out with me for the Karma. I seem to have good commuting Karma lately. Just one more point to belabor this thread. I too have seen lots of oversold flights lately (good for making money, not good for commuting) and we both need to remind ourselves who [over]sells those seats (yep, good old UAL).
yes you should hang out with me for the Karma. I seem to have good commuting Karma lately. Just one more point to belabor this thread. I too have seen lots of oversold flights lately (good for making money, not good for commuting) and we both need to remind ourselves who [over]sells those seats (yep, good old UAL).
Farely said; yes you should hang out with me for the Karma. I seem to have good commuting Karma lately. Just one more point to belabor this thread. I too have seen lots of oversold flights lately (good for making money, not good for commuting) and we both need to remind ourselves who sells those seats (yep, good old UAL).
Farely,
Something I just learned over the weekend: UAL was unaware of the severe weight restrictions that ACA often has on the longer routes they are flying. In fact UAL made ACA buy the gross weight increase for the CRJ's. The cost of operating (by UAL) the CRJ are very high. As soon as they start taking load seats then most of the profits are washed away. From what I understand the margins on the ACA contract are pretty thin for UAL. Anyway, the load seats on the J-41 have been finally seen and hopefully they too will see some type of improvement to the amount of load seats. One idea that has been discussed by the ALPA RCRC (regional carrier review cmmte) is to only book and limit bookings to 26 seats. Apollo would have to be triggered to show 0's in all classes as soon as the bookings got to 29, that 3 oversold from 26. Anyway, that is enough to beat a dead horse.
Let me know where you find that lucky commuting rabbits foot.
Farely,
Something I just learned over the weekend: UAL was unaware of the severe weight restrictions that ACA often has on the longer routes they are flying. In fact UAL made ACA buy the gross weight increase for the CRJ's. The cost of operating (by UAL) the CRJ are very high. As soon as they start taking load seats then most of the profits are washed away. From what I understand the margins on the ACA contract are pretty thin for UAL. Anyway, the load seats on the J-41 have been finally seen and hopefully they too will see some type of improvement to the amount of load seats. One idea that has been discussed by the ALPA RCRC (regional carrier review cmmte) is to only book and limit bookings to 26 seats. Apollo would have to be triggered to show 0's in all classes as soon as the bookings got to 29, that 3 oversold from 26. Anyway, that is enough to beat a dead horse.
Let me know where you find that lucky commuting rabbits foot.
