STL rumored to become focus city

[MCI transplant]

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On 7/11/2003 11:54:29 PM nyc6035 wrote:

There''s an interesting idea...have the state of MO buy back the assets of TWA from AMR for oh lets say $500MM...$742MM minus the $ AMR got for the Worldspan position less some depreciation.

They could use the money they had allocated for building the 3rd runway to finance the venture.

They might as well use the $ for buying the airline. It makes zero sense to build a 3rd runway at STL without a hub carrier.

If you figure 20K employees at 40K a year in salary at say 10% income tax that works out to $80M per year in additional income tax revenue. At current interest rates that would be enough to pay off the $500M in borrowings.

I say go for it:

Take the TWA LLC operating license
The slots/route authorities
The Name
27 757s
perhaps 50-80 of the MD80s (although I always thought this was the only part of TWA that AMR really wanted)
The MCI Hanger
Ground equipment equivilent to what was acquired by AMR in the courts
A 5 year code-share agreement
Receiprical Frequent Flyer benefits for 5 years
Access to the personnel data for all former TWA llc employees

So would AMR be an interested seller?
Would they be an interested seller if the State of MO. threatened a lawsuit?

Then...since it''s flight of fancy hour...in six months time after having stabilized the carrier, merge the outfit with America West who agree to take over the bond payments as the price of the deal.


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I''ll go for that! I''ll even give back my A.A. thirty year pin!!!!!

 

[jimntx]

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On 7/11/2003 6:58:36 PM MiAAmi wrote:

If we shut down STL as a hub I hope they move the flying rather than a big parking of aircraft. I have to wonder where we would be financially if we had never bought TWA. I''m not saying that TWA is the cause of where we are financially but maybe we would would have been in a much better setting had we just stayed #2.

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AMR would still be teetering on the brink of bankruptcy. The presence or absence of the small amount of TWA debt that AMR inherited is a drop in the bucket to the total disaster that AMR is today.

Staying #2 was NOT an option. AMR''s management was (and is) too ego-driven to give up the "world''s largest airline" title. The TWA purchase had more similarity with a testosterone-instigated p*ss*ing contest than with a good business decision. As soon as the United/USAir merger was blocked, the need for TWA disappeared. I''d be willing to bet that when the news came down that merger was not going to happen, the planning to close the STL hub and furlough the workers began almost immediately.

 

[AAmech]

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On 7/11/2003 6:58:36 PM MiAAmi wrote:

If we shut down STL as a hub I hope they move the flying rather than a big parking of aircraft. I have to wonder where we would be financially if we had never bought TWA. I''m not saying that TWA is the cause of where we are financially but maybe we would would have been in a much better setting had we just stayed #2.

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I doubt we''d be very far from where we are today. Carty and Arpey had the horrible luck of applying for a 800million dollar loan on 9/11. If they had done it on 9/10 just one day earlier it may have bought us more time but thats about it. We''d be in Denial longer like the CO ,DL or NW employees. The problems AA has on on the Cost side of the equation. Owning TWA or not owning TWA matters very little.

 

[Hopeful]

Go for it!

Sell everything back to the state of Missouri!
Take the people back too!


You see, I''m not worried about AA filing Chapter 11 or even Chapter 7 because you TWAers will just SUE SUE SUE SUE SUE SUE SUE to prevent AA from shutting its doors because they broke their promise to you.

Do you think you have the lock on broken promises.
Ameircan promised everyone from the day they were hired that they would have a pension. The pension will be the next little tidbit to go the way of the horse and wagon. Well guess what? How much of your pension did you get from TWA?

Hey! Why don''t you sue the Wright brothers for starting this whole aviation fad because had they not, you would have chose another career?

 

[TAN 767 300]

As a customer wathing all this unfold, one (of many) thing comes to mind...I recently read somewhere that there are 50 some odd F-100''s yet to be taken out of service for cost/fleet comonality, etc. That means just to maintain something close to current flying about 50 replacement aircraft have to be fitted in.

Hmmm..if you cut back STL mainline, free up about 50 ex-TWA MD-80''s you have solved that problem...sorta.

That means you shift those smaller-mid markets from STL to EAgle/Connection flying (ERJ/CRJ) where many of those MD-80s have been flying. (the MD-80 is too big for many of those markets..thats why the 717 was perfect) You maintain mainline market presence to 15-18large cities with the MD-80/757 (LGA/DCA/BOS/MIA/MCO/TPA/DTW/DFW/ATL/ORD/DEN/PHX/LAX/SNA/SAN/SFO/SJC/SEA/PDX)

My guess would be later, when profits have returned, some (probably not all) of those MD-80s will drift back to STL..when the STL market can be profitable again.Keep in mind, there are hundreds of 737NG''s on deferred order/option for years to come.

Remember STL is supposed to be a "reliever" hub, and take more of the lowest fare (internet) traffic...but you have to be able to do that at a cost that makes sense.As conditions have caused layoffs..you usually loose you lowest cost employees first..so actually your cost goes up initially until you can add back more newer ones at lower cost.( sorta vicious circle).

My bet is that a re-structuring of STL is in store for 2-3 years. ( I still wonder if a deal was struck with Boeing to take back the 717''s in exchange for a hard look at them sometime later when an agreement to put them uder EAgle could be made....intersting thought?

Good Luck to all in STL....Go BLUES!

 

[MiAAmi]

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On 7/12/2003 8:02:33 AM jimntx wrote:

AMR would still be teetering on the brink of bankruptcy. The presence or absence of the small amount of TWA debt that AMR inherited is a drop in the bucket to the total disaster that AMR is today.


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Still, the purchase of TWA did not help. Many things have weighed AMR down since 9-11 and TWA is definitly one of them. If that were not true we wouldn''t even be discussing the closing of STL as a hub.

 

[MCI transplant]

Hopeful-----Your right! We would SUE!!!!!

 

[jimntx]

On 7/11/2003 1:53:41 PM jimntx wrote:

I think people are confusing the issue of whether or not there is an STL flight attendant/pilot base and whether AA operates STL as a hub.

TWANR responded:
I think that the mayor and the governor do know the difference: (attached newspaper article removed by me to cut length).

Hey, I replied when all we had to go on were rumors and it was a best guess based upon AMR's past actions. If you had posted the newspaper article first, I would have known that it was more than rumor.

That news was NOT disseminated in the DFW area where AMR controls the news that is reported about it. As far as those of us who are furloughed know down here, AMR is still nebulously "looking at all options."

 

[Workingman]

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On 7/12/2003 7:49:57 AM Hopeful wrote:

Go for it!

Sell everything back to the state of Missouri!
Take the people back too!


You see, I''m not worried about AA filing Chapter 11 or even Chapter 7 because you TWAers will just SUE SUE SUE SUE SUE SUE SUE to prevent AA from shutting its doors because they broke their promise to you.

AA not only broke the promise to the TWA employees but also to Judge Walsh and the court with the verbal and written ASSEST PURCHASE AGREEMENT. AA also broke a verbal assurence to Sen. Bond "that former TWA workers in St. Louis and elsewhere will be treated fairly and NOT SINGLED OUT DURING THE LAY-OFFS.

The really immoral way they treated their own employees was by lying to them about the buy out of TWA and all the trouble that followed. And to add gas to the fire getting all the concessions from the AA people while lying to them/or withholding information about the pensions.

Then there is the nice unions AA is dealing with. They have a problem of failing to represent a member or to inform the member that AA is hiring off the street while the TWA employees are on the street. They layoff EVERY ONE OF THE TWA FA''s.

I don''t think sue is even the right word.





Do you think you have the lock on broken promises.
Ameircan promised everyone from the day they were hired that they would have a pension. The pension will be the next little tidbit to go the way of the horse and wagon. Well guess what? How much of your pension did you get from TWA?

Hey! Why don''t you sue the Wright brothers for starting this whole aviation fad because had they not, you would have chose another career?

What AA gets and what happens to them they brought own themselves.

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[TWAnr]

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On 7/12/2003 12:53:48 PM jimntx wrote:

Hey, I replied when all we had to go on were rumors and it was a best guess based upon AMR's past actions. If you had posted the newspaper article first, I would have known that it was more than rumor.

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I am sorry, but that article was only published yesterday, July 11, 2003. It did confirm what some of us knew for almost a week.

Here are highlights from today's St. Louis Post-Dispatch article on the subject:

With Lambert cuts likely, city reconsiders its options
By KEN LEISER Post-Dispatch
updated: 07/12/2003 11:42 AM

Now threatened in this latest review are the Lambert hub operation, the St. Louis ticket reservation office and the aging aircraft overhaul base at Kansas City International Airport, officials say.

"Clearly the world has changed with the downturn in travel and all of the events that have affected the travel industry," said Joe Driskill, director of the Missouri Department of Economic Development. "With the review of all of the airlines' operations, it has become clear that all bets seem to be off."

One thing that has become apparent, Driskill said, is that American's change of leadership has altered the airline's posture toward St. Louis. Under previous Chief Executive Don Carty, there was an acknowledgment of American's continuing "special role" here. New CEO Gerard Arpey was described by one local leader as more of "a numbers man."

"Let's just say that it appears that their view of St. Louis and Missouri is different than it was in previous times when we were all talking about how American would continue the service that TWA once offered," said Driskill, who joined Holden and Slay on the Texas trip on Friday.

Through a spokeswoman, American declined to comment further on the progress of its operational review.

St. Louis County Executive George R. "Buzz" Westfall acknowledged that St. Louis is the new kid on the block as far as American is concerned.

"I would suspect that if the downturn in the airline business continues," Westfall said, "the bad news will be in St. Louis."

The belt-tightening could reach beyond the airport. St. Louis is home to one of eight American reservation offices. The airline said it will look at the "volume and nature of calls" that are parceled out among those offices.

St. Louis officials on Friday repeated their own offers to American executives. Those include subsidizing the cost of renovations to the three airport concourses American uses at Lambert. The city also showed the airline alternative sites to its current St. Louis reservations office downtown and has offered cash subsidies, forgivable loans and tax credits to try to keep it here.

American and its regional partners offer 416 daily departures from St. Louis to about 100 other cities, said airline spokeswoman Julia Bishop Cross. Two years ago, there were 522 departures out of Lambert a day.

As evidence of how reliant the airport has become on its hub status, consider that connecting passengers accounted for about 54 percent of Lambert traffic last year, according to a May report that accompanied an airport bond sale. The rest were passengers who either began or ended their trips here.

[url="http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/News/F12FFE4007B4164386256D610031A9D7?OpenDocument&Headline=With+Lambert+cuts+likely,+city+reconsiders+its+options"]http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stor...ers+its+options[/URL]

 

[acmech]

The purchase deal between Dirty rotten AA and TWA can be undone. Remember Noah and the great flood? What was done then can be undone.

If the TWA BOD had any idea that American would treat TWA folks so poorly, that so many would loose their jobs, the deal between TWA and AA would never have come about.


Justice will be served upon those who have caused/are causing harm, one way or the other. Count on it.

 

[Winglet]

Noah and the flood. That''s really good.

Now you''re counting on divine intervention. Excellent. That might save TWA, but the politicians, courts, and AA won''t.

 

[acmech]

I thought the humor would help.