Slot Transaction, E-190 Sale, Crew Base Closures, & Realignment Designed to Shop the Company for Sal

[N903AW]

Looking WAY back ...... a PHX hub was on Bill Howard and Piedmont Airlines wish list in the 80's. PHX is solid ....

Even Allegheny's first destination west of the Mississippi post-deregulation was....not Los Angeles, not San Francisco, not Seattle/Tacoma, not Denver....but (GASP), PHOENIX!

Look at the route map on the link provided....WOW! What a huge airline back then with global reach! Defintely world class and not regional like America West!

Allegheny Airlines 1979

 

[nic4us]

LOL that is laughable I am not sure all those westside transfers we are getting here would agree with you

It was supposed to be. But I defy all these, "all the money is made out east" pontificators to actually prove any of their claims.

How many of those Westside transfers are formerly furloughed east employees recalled to West operations as a result of the merger?

 

[Travelpro72]

Even Allegheny's first destination west of the Mississippi post-deregulation was....not Los Angeles, not San Francisco, not Seattle/Tacoma, not Denver....but (GASP), PHOENIX!

Look at the route map on the link provided....WOW! What a huge airline back then with global reach! Defintely world class and not regional like America West!

Allegheny Airlines 1979

Ummmm the year was 1979. :blink: Your comparing Allegheny in 79 to America West before the merger? :huh: I don't get it

 

[N903AW]

Ummmm the year was 1979. :blink: Your comparing Allegheny in 79 to America West before the merger? :huh: I don't get it

Well I could have put a route map of AWA in 1979 up, but it would have been a blank page!

 

[Travelpro72]

Well I can see where this thread is going. My airline was better than yours and my HUB is more profitable than yours. NEWSFLASH! ! ! ! We all work for the same airline (some contractually divided) and it collectively sucks and is not feared by ANY and I repeat ANY airline out there down to Allegiant or Sun Country.

 

[Edward]

ff: As the above poster stated this is starting to go the wrong way, let get back to the topic of the op.

 

[Travelpro72]

My only hope and wish is that the decisions being made by management will keep us ALL employed and make the airline profitable. I know it's a lot to ask for and I'm not thoroughly convinced but one can hope. Though Debbie Downer has lots to say on here and won't shy away from shooting down management or anything that stinks of BS I hope these changes will help the company. The changes are made/being made so we must deal.

 

[back2CLT]

Sure, wilbur. They set the bar with pricing because they have some of the lowest costs. They'll take a yield beating.

They have the lowest cost system wide because they traditionally flew to airports with low costs and where they were able to make quick turns allowing them to spread the fixed costs of the planes among a greater number of flights, which reduces CASM. Now go reread, what I wrote. They are entering LGA and BOS which are the anti-thesis of the types of environments that have helped keep low costs.

Your logic is goes something like, "I've stayed sober because I don't drink alcohol, but now that I am drinking, I will be the most sober person out there" Yes, I can read annual reports of all airlines, and spout historical trends, but I'm also don't believe in regurgitating so called truths, when current actions indicate an exteme deviation from historical behavior.

You know the difference between a 20 year US or HP shareholder and a 20 year WN shareholder, right?

I actually was a LUV shareholder from about mid-2002 to mid-2005. The stock has NEVER hit my buy price in 2002 over the last 7+ years. This backs into my point about what I think is driving SW's current strategy. They need to find growth, consistent mediocre profits aren't cutting it. A crappy-to-non-existent dividend isn't exciting me when I'm seeing annual depreciation in my holdings. Therefore, they are looking to make splashes in the big markets where they think their name alone will carry them in picking up enough market share to make a profit, never mind at a reduced margin due to costs. But hey, if you think its a great time to buy LUV, be my guest. You can sell them back to me at loss to cover my short.

 

[nycbusdriver]

Even Allegheny's first destination west of the Mississippi post-deregulation was....not Los Angeles, not San Francisco, not Seattle/Tacoma, not Denver....but (GASP), PHOENIX!

Look at the route map on the link provided....WOW! What a huge airline back then with global reach! Defintely world class and not regional like America West!

Allegheny Airlines 1979

Hmm.

Somebody on mahogany row in Crystal City in 1979 probably bought a winter home in PHX and wanted to get back and forth to work.

Or...

PHX was chosen over the actual "west coast" (those are cities that are actually ON the west coast) because USAir could not bear the thought of actually having transcontinental service (just like they were terrified when they were bullied into keeping the Piedmont London authority and thereby having transoceanic (YIKES!!!) service.)

The only bunch of yahoos with more of a regional mentality than Crystal City crowd of the 70s and 80s is the Tempe brain trust.

 

[phllax]

The PHX routes were awarded during regulation by the CAB.

 

[Al Legheny]

USA320Pilot comments: A question was asked at the October 23 Employee State of the Airline Meeting about a rumor where the company would be sold and split up with the East going to American and the West to Republic. Doug Parker said, "US Airways absolutely will not split up the airline to sell. This is not happening and will not happen. This is patently (a) false (rumor). That is not going to happen!"


Attributing ANY forward looking logic to Parker's statements is pure folly. Besides the various denials over the years of base closings, we now see our sold 190's being deployed domestically, rather than the stated "out of country" use only.

The "spin off" idea probably is a pipe dream, but to many seems to be the biggest fantasy solution out there. Under East scope, outside of a BK filing, it will be the union that decides how any fragmentations are doled out. In theory, the union could actually say only red headed pilots, or tall pilots "go" elsewhere. Obviously that is extreme, but West scope does not have this. Since the two groups are still operating under separate contracts, but fall under one union, even the fallback position of each group's scope applying leaves the West in peril. Those that think a few more days vacation and a small raise are worth giving up a strong scope clause have not been paying attention to the industry. Giving an inch on scope would be, again...pure folly.

RR

RR,

I agree, if you want to see what scope really means just look at this ALPA video example:

http://www.alpa.tv/DesktopModules/Ul...81&portalId=14

It's about the last flight of Midwest Espress, the last real flght with origional Midwest employees.

That is what your scope is worth.

 

[FlyUs]

This is not true, as there is plenty of open gate space in D/E at most times of the day. Based on what I have heard, SWA doesn't even want all of the new gates in E that are under construction.

If that is true.. great. I was under the impression that WN was waiting for more gate space

 

[Travelpro72]

"WHO" said that WN doesn't want all their new gates soon to open in Terminal E? Really? Someone will take the space.....no worries IF thats the case.

 

[FlyUs]

Hmm.

Somebody on mahogany row in Crystal City in 1979 probably bought a winter home in PHX and wanted to get back and forth to work.

Or...

PHX was chosen over the actual "west coast" (those are cities that are actually ON the west coast) because USAir could not bear the thought of actually having transcontinental service (just like they were terrified when they were bullied into keeping the Piedmont London authority and thereby having transoceanic (YIKES!!!) service.)

The only bunch of yahoos with more of a regional mentality than Crystal City crowd of the 70s and 80s is the Tempe brain trust.

So true.. I miss Wolfe and Gangwall! LOL. They weren't afraid of the competition and offered a great product. Of course they were trying to sell it off.. but who didn't?? They're still looking for a sucker.. I mean merger

 

[wings396]

"WHO" said that WN doesn't want all their new gates soon to open in Terminal E? Really? Someone will take the space.....no worries IF thats the case.

AirTran will already have 2 of them, while SWA is leaving 5-6 gates behind in D. I don't think that the addition to E will yield more than 6 new gates. While I don't know the exact amount of gates in each terminal, the math doesn't give SWA any more gates, it just consolidates them into one common gate area. Remember that this construction for SWA was planned back when they figured that they would go "gangbusters" in PHL while US faded away. As we all know, that hasn't happened and SWA has stunted their growth plans in PHL as well. Only time will tell what their long term plans are in PHL. I also forgot to mention that NW will vacate 2 gates in E, and will go over to D when they combine operations with DL. So the end result may give SWA 1 more gate if they take all of them in E, and if my numbers are correct.