To answer your question, no one.
The conventional wisdom of Comair line pilot in the late 80s early 90s was that the fifty seat airplane we would eventually get would be the Saab 2000. 50 seats was the scope limit at the time on the airframes that flew Delta code.
Comair management and Bombardier conspired on the 50 seat jet to get in under the limit.
When the CL-700 became available, Comair put orders and options down on 90 aircraft. At the time, we were an independent company flying our own code in addition to our code share agreement with Delta. Comair ordered the 700s for Comair flying.
Before any of this can be fixed, ALPA will have to admit that basing a scope clause on the exclusion of airframes by seat number instead of the inclusion of pilots doing the flying is doomed to fail.
They won't. The dirty little secret is that the mainliners sell scope relief
to management for enhancements to the mainline contract.
Wrong.
DALPA did it in 1996. They were getting lots of perks (offline JS) and a raise. I wish there was some press still around, but I remember reading that they didn't want to fly the jets. So, they gave the scope up, when it should have been tightened. When I was with TSA, TWA's scope was speed limited. I believe they could not codeshare with any operator in the US that flew aircraft faster than 375TAS.
I also remember talking to some AMR guys. They were saying the Fokkers were bought to put on another cert. with "B-" payscales. Eagle? AMR was next, then CAL. UAL with Air Whiskey, had a very specific exclusion, so there wasn't a whole lot of growth opportunity with them. Besides, they were flying BAe146's.
I would imagine that it was sold to the DALPA line much as it was sold to my group at ATA. We allowed the company to sub out 50 seat jets, although it never happened. It was sold that these jets "generate revenue." A big pile of it. And ATA-ALPA could take advantage of that in future negotiations to ensure a pay raise based on total revenue the company was taking in. There was no explanation as to why mainline revenue would be excluded in the this total. Sound like BS? I agree, and said so at the time. No one was listening after they saw the rest of the contract. Little stuff like that passes when there lots of other "goodies" in the rest of the contract. ALPA Nat'l is more than willing to accommodate to get a contract.
The concept of "RJ's to profitability" is marginal. It is that a 50 seat jet loses less money on given route than say a B737-200 or DC9-30, but market share is retained, frequency can be increased and it feeds the fat-boys (phat-boys?) going over-seas/int'l. There has never been a profitable stand-alone RJ airline.
There's camel sh!t inside the tent already. There's no going back. Those of you that are captains on an RJ should pretty much plan on staying there. The cut in pay, the loss of seniority, and the risk of furlough fodder in jumping ship really wouldn't be worth it.
