Roundup – The Old and the New

By | September 29, 2007

We’ve been a bit occupied of lot, and have a lot to catch up on. Rest assured, that while this is not our primary responsibility(we have jobs), we hope to be back on top of things soon, bringing the best in air travel developments in a timely fashion.

  • Hagerstown Airport, 80 miles northwest of downtown Washington D.C., is in danger of losing its only service…Air Midwest regional service to Pittsburgh. The service has been subsidized by the federal government, but this expires this week, and efforts are being made to compell the carrier to continue the service till year’s end or a replacement can be found.
  • American Eagle is going to start service from Milwaukee to Marquette, Michigan on December 13th. Service will be daily, except Saturday. We are curious about this service. Milwaukee is not really a focus city for the carrier, and it seems a stretch for them.
  • British Airways ended decades of loyalty to Boeing when it ordered 12 A380 superjumbos from Airbus. It did order 24 787 Dreamliners, however. Overall, they are replacing 34 older aircraft, and will use the 380s to make best use of limited take-off slots at Heathrow.
  • American Airlines has unveiled a change reservation feature on its website for passengers who are traveling with an electronic ticket wholly on American and purchased directly with the airline through its website or other reservation methods. With another airline eliminating the need to call them for changes, it will allow these carriers to train their call center employees to a higher degree, as they will now need less.
  • Jetblue has added more flights from Boston to Florida, and now offers 28 daily flights…7 to Ft. Lauderdale, 6 to Ft. Myers, 7 to Orlando, 4 to Tampa, and 4 to West Palm Beach.
  • Jetblue also announced nonstop service to Orlando from Buffalo, Rochester, and Portland, ME. Buffalo and Rochester service is to begin November 15th, and Portland service to begin January 10th. Service will be once daily…the New York service will be operated with A320 aircraft, and the Portland service with E190s.
  • Virgin America launched its twice daily service from San Francisco to Washington-Dulles on Wednesday. Service from Dulles to Los Angeles will begin on October 24th.
  • TAM will begin daily flights to Montevideo, Uruguay from Sao Paulo on November 5th. Tam also launched a new flight from Rio de Janiero with stops in Sao Paulo and Manaus en route to Caracas, Venezuela. Unlike many airlines, TAM is aiming to decentralize its service, reverting to a route model of flying instead of a hub and spoke method.
  • San Bernadino Airport is wondering whether or not the airport, 65 miles east of Los Angeles, could be the next area airport. Even though San Bernadino is only 25 miles from Ontario Airport, they feel the airport has a chance, subdividing the Los Angeles market and drawing passengers away from the already congest LAX airport.
  • Delta Airlines announced new service from Atlanta to Stockholm six times weekly effective June 3rd, 2008.
  • VRG has launched daily operations from Sao Paulo to Paris with onward service to Rome and back.
  • Continental is set to inaugurate service to Mumbai nonstop from Newark Liberty Airport. Service will be four times a week until October 28th, when it comes daily.