Logan Airport Flights and Airlines Discussion

[BosDevelop]

I would prefer the red eye for a short stay in Vegas.

Really? You must be much better with a night of 3 hours of sleep in a cramped seat then I am. Even for a quick trip, I much rather fly in late Thursday night and then take the noon Sunday flight home so I am not a complete mess at work the next day (or even more of a mess than I would normally be after a weekend in Vegas). I find that 3 days in Vegas is generally enough and there is no need to stay the extra 10-11 hours and either trot your luggage around town with you or trust your valuables being stored with the bellmen all day. Every time I have booked the redeye, I regret it and wish I was on the midday flight instead.

 

[mass88]

I could be wrong, but I think JetBlue does 3 x daily on a seasonal basis. I was out in Vegas last October and I had 3 non-stop flight options to choose from when booking the tickets. I was on a Las Vegas - Boston flight that left Nevada at around 4 pm and had friends who were on a Las Vegas - Boston flight that left Nevada around noontime I believe, in addition to the red-eye flight back to Boston.

 

[adamh8297]

Really? You must be much better with a night of 3 hours of sleep in a cramped seat then I am. Even for a quick trip, I much rather fly in late Thursday night and then take the noon Sunday flight home so I am not a complete mess at work the next day (or even more of a mess than I would normally be after a weekend in Vegas). I find that 3 days in Vegas is generally enough and there is no need to stay the extra 10-11 hours and either trot your luggage around town with you or trust your valuables being stored with the bellmen all day. Every time I have booked the redeye, I regret it and wish I was on the midday flight instead.

I probably would have a backpack - I'm thinking 2 day quick trip.

 

[kmp1284]

Obviously it's not set in stone but according to their early winter 15 schedule, it looks like Lufthansa will be keeping the 748 on Boston-Frankfurt and Munich will remain a 346.

 

[adamh8297]

Another new destination in Asia is on the horizon.

Hainan Airlines has applied with DOT to serve Boston-Shanghai Pudong three times weekly.

http://airlineinfo.com/ostpdf92/434.pdf

Proposed start date appears to be June 20th. No schedule (times/days) was list. There are not as many connections on the Shanghai end as Beijing for Hainan.

 

[lexicon506]

Hainan Airlines has applied with DOT to serve Boston-Shanghai Pudong three times weekly.

What a strange announcement.. direct service to Shanghai is obviously a great thing, but wouldn't it make infinitely more sense with China Eastern?

Hainan has next to no connections in Shanghai and would be relying almost exclusively on O&D traffic. China Eastern, on the other hand, has a massive hub there. Do they not have the equipment to fly this route?

In any case, if Korean can hurry up and launch Seoul than Logan's East Asia portfolio will be complete! And to get from zero to this point took all of what, 3 years? Impressive.

 

[Arlington]

Another new destination in Asia is on the horizon.

Hainan Airlines has applied with DOT to serve Boston-Shanghai Pudong three times weekly.

http://airlineinfo.com/ostpdf92/434.pdf

Proposed start date appears to be June 20th. No schedule (times/days) was list. There are not as many connections on the Shanghai end as Beijing for Hainan.

On page 13 of their filing, they show a forecasted loss of ~$3m on revenues of ~$52.5m in their first year. Is this typical? Seems like what would be "dumping" if it were widgets and not seats.

 

[whighlander]

On page 13 of their filing, they show a forecasted loss of ~$3m on revenues of ~$52.5m in their first year. Is this typical? Seems like what would be "dumping" if it were widgets and not seats.

Arlington -- the term is "Loss Leader" or more prosaically the cost of introduction -- the assumption si that as soon as people got familiar with the service that the next year or so they would operate at a sufficient load factor to make some $

Personally, I think a Korean connection is much more valuable

 

[Arlington]

Arlington -- the term is "Loss Leader" or more prosaically the cost of introduction -- the assumption si that as soon as people got familiar with the service that the next year or so they would operate at a sufficient load factor to make some $

I was really wondering how their model compared to other models seen in other filings, not whether you have a better/different word for it.

And this is where the US Airlines, if they did have the same "anti-dumping" protections that US industry does, would have a point that foreign competitors in manufacturing industries are not permitted to buy market share by selling things for less than cost. "Cost of Introduction" or "Buying Market Share" or "Dumping" or "Predatory Pricing" --they are all fairly close to each other conceptually. Where is the line?

So how much less than cost--how deep the losses, and for how long--are the foreign carriers permitted before the US says "these losses, while good for consumers, are bad for the long-term health of international travel"

 

[LH421]

Not Logan related but Jetblue has immediately added Fort Lauderdale-Cleveland/Detroit. This industry will always be noted for its pettiness.

If that's really what you think just goes to show how unfamiliar you are with the industry today and how network planning departments actually function.

 

[adamh8297]

If that's really what you think just goes to show how unfamiliar you are with the industry today and how network planning departments actually function.

It still happens and those network planning departments plan for it if X airline starts Y route. Check the press release about the Fort Lauderdale-Detroit/Cleveland flights: They take a jab at Spirit in it. I guarantee you Delta has bullets ready to fly if Jetblue goes into Atlanta or Minneapolis.

Recent History:

Jetblue starts Boston-Detroit - at the time was a monopoly route for nonstop service for Delta.

A couple weeks later.....

Delta starts Boston-Jacksonville, weekly Boston-Providenciales and weekly Boston-Nassau and extends those along with weekly Boston-Cancun throughout the summer, and then gives up another monopoly Boston-Norfolk and launches Boston-Richmond with those planes.

In turn, Jetblue extends weekly service to Nassau throughout the summer as well.

A few months later... Delta drops Nassau and Providenciales for Summer 2015. Jetblue ditches Nassau for 2015 a month or so after that.

 

[mass88]

First off, I am blown away by how much service to Asia Logan will have assuming Shaghai comes online. At this point just 3 years ago, we did not have any non-stop service, even though JAL had announced Tokyo flights.


November Logan numbers are out:

Through November YTD

Total Passengers: 29,213,661 (up 4.8% over 2013)
Total International Passengers: 4,623,539 (up 9.6% over 2013)
Total Domestic Passengers: 24,499,750 (up 4.0% over 2013)

Avg load on Europe flights: 196 passengers
Avg load on Asia flights: 169 passengers
Avg load on Middle East flights: 201 passengers
Avg load on Copa flights: 85 passengers

I would imagine there have been some flights to Istanbul and Dubai that have gone out pretty light.

 

[LH421]

It still happens and those network planning departments plan for it if X airline starts Y route. Check the press release about the Fort Lauderdale-Detroit/Cleveland flights: They take a jab at Spirit in it. I guarantee you Delta has bullets ready to fly if Jetblue goes into Atlanta or Minneapolis.

Recent History:

Jetblue starts Boston-Detroit - at the time was a monopoly route for nonstop service for Delta.

A couple weeks later.....

Delta starts Boston-Jacksonville, weekly Boston-Providenciales and weekly Boston-Nassau and extends those along with weekly Boston-Cancun throughout the summer, and then gives up another monopoly Boston-Norfolk and launches Boston-Richmond with those planes.

In turn, Jetblue extends weekly service to Nassau throughout the summer as well.

A few months later... Delta drops Nassau and Providenciales for Summer 2015. Jetblue ditches Nassau for 2015 a month or so after that.

You may characterize it petty but I know from my experience working for major carriers in the current environment that's increasingly less and less the case given capacity discipline in a consolidated industry but hey you believe whatever want.

 

[adamh8297]

First off, I am blown away by how much service to Asia Logan will have assuming Shaghai comes online. At this point just 3 years ago, we did not have any non-stop service, even though JAL had announced Tokyo flights.


November Logan numbers are out:

Through November YTD

Total Passengers: 29,213,661 (up 4.8% over 2013)
Total International Passengers: 4,623,539 (up 9.6% over 2013)
Total Domestic Passengers: 24,499,750 (up 4.0% over 2013)

Avg load on Europe flights: 196 passengers
Avg load on Asia flights: 169 passengers
Avg load on Middle East flights: 201 passengers
Avg load on Copa flights: 85 passengers

I would imagine there have been some flights to Istanbul and Dubai that have gone out pretty light.

The mideast flights were a bit low. (66.7% LF average) but Asia was once again (86.3%) based on 60 Tokyo and 34 Beijing flights --- we'll have to wait and see who did better or worse when BTS releases their data in 6 months.

CM BOS-PTY improved YOY but Massport appears to not have classified BOS-LIR as Central America so who knows how accurate the data is.

BTS did release T100 for June 2014/July 2014 so we can finally

June:

BOS-PTY = 82%
BOS-IST = 88%
BOS-DXB = 87%
BOS-NRT = 88%
BOS-PEK = HU did not report for the month

July
BOS-PTY = 89.0%
BOS-IST = 87.8%
BOS-DXB = 87.5%
BOS-NRT = 86.1%
BOS-PEK = 88.4 %

 

[adamh8297]

United and Southwest are adding Boston-Phoenix to meet Super Bowl demand now that the Patriots will be playing. Southwest will also do Manchester NH-Phoenix. These are scheduled services and not charters which there will be many as well.

JetBlue has also added an extra daily flight before and after that weekend.

No increases yet by AA/US.

 

[mass88]

Just price out flights on United, Southwest and JetBlue. All were in the $1550 - $1650 range round trip.

 

[Arlington]

Just price out flights on United, Southwest and JetBlue. All were in the $1550 - $1650 range round trip.

Sounds reasonable to me. I know that looks high, but if you've decided on going to the Superbowl, being able to score discount last-minute airline tix on a nonstop is probably not your go/no-go factor, and you're probably not going to risk a connection.

(Any sense of the connecting market? My gut would be that there were enough FFs who'd already booked flights from the big hubs that there probably wasn't much slack supply on normal/connecting flights into PHX left by now)

This is about as much like a business trip as a leisure trip can get.

 

[kmp1284]

$19,717 on USAir, flexible F.

 

[Arlington]

$19,717 on USAir, flexible F.

In years past, it has proved entertaining to use FlightTracker to watch the mobs of corporate, personal, and time-share jets trying to get outta town immediately after the game (usually from a reliever airport like TEB). Even at very short spacings, it takes a lot of time to launch them all, since they all crush to leave at exactly the same time (and get back to BOS or BED at the smae time)

I suspect US/AA know exactly how higher-end options price out and have priced accordingly.

 

[adamh8297]

In years past, it has proved entertaining to use FlightTracker to watch the mobs of corporate, personal, and time-share jets trying to get outta town immediately after the game (usually from a reliever airport like TEB). Even at very short spacings, it takes a lot of time to launch them all, since they all crush to leave at exactly the same time (and get back to BOS or BED at the smae time)

I suspect US/AA know exactly how higher-end options price out and have priced accordingly.

To a person with an income of 1 million that is equivalent to a person making 75K and paying $1516.