Will DCI Benefit From USAir PIT Closure?

[FurloughedAgain]

Just a few thoughts.

If US Airways truly intends to shutter its Pittsburgh hub operation as predicted by Michael Boyd then there may well open a variety of small cities who will require air service.

I believe there are a few markets which would have a lot of potential for DCI to build markets which, at one time, supported US Airways mainline service.

Just off the top of my head:

Ithica, NY
Elmira, NY (Cornell University)
Johnstown, PA
Altoona, PA
Lancaster, PA
Youngstown, OH
Jamestown, NY
Watertown, NY
Utica, NY
Hamilton, ON Canada
London, ON Canada
Hagerstown, MD
Trenton, NJ
Nantucket, MA
Williamsport, PA

Several of these cities used to support US Airways mainline service.

They are large. growing communities which would benefit from being a part of the network and could provide valuable feed to Delta Air Lines. Certainly some, if not all of these cities could support at LEAST a few flights a day on a DornierJet or ATR.

If US Airways abandons the PIT hub could some of these cities not support one or two CVG and one or two ATL connections a day?

Just thinking out-loud about how DCI might benefit from the poor business decisions made by my former employer.

 

[rk772]

Pittsburgh news reported a few days ago that the US Air/KPIT contract has been extended till Sept. 2004

 

[Gumby_dog]

From you list..
London, ON Canada... yes, it did have U.S. Air service (it was not mainline, it was Chq.. a SAAB from PIT, but yes it would support any sort of service.. it is a huge business town, only serviced by AC jazz to Toronto and Mesaba to DTW... but for whatever reason they dropped it a few years ago..

Jet service to HGR...maybe? but loads are generally crappy to and from there..

Just thoughts..

 

[dondk]

Re: Will DCI Benefit From USAir PIT Clos

Just a few thoughts.

I believe there are a few markets which would have a lot of potential for DCI to build markets which, at one time, supported US Airways mainline service.

Just off the top of my head:

Ithica, NY
Elmira, NY (Cornell University)
Johnstown, PA
Altoona, PA
Lancaster, PA
Youngstown, OH
Jamestown, NY
Watertown, NY
Utica, NY
Hamilton, ON Canada
London, ON Canada
Hagerstown, MD
Trenton, NJ
Nantucket, MA
Williamsport, PA

Ithaca/Elmira was mainline, F-100's which were usually 1/2 full except for the start and end of college semesters.

Most of the other cities either had a 737 , DC-9 or F-100 for a short period of time before going to props. Thinking about it..
Maybe this is one of the reasons U is in the financial position it is in. Hard to understand the need to fly decent size equipment into these smaller cities with high paid crews and high paid ground staff.

I know in ITH the average seniority of the ground staff was better than 17 years, with the ony a few people less than 7 years. They were for the most part all top of the pay scale.

Now most of those cities are supported by one of the contract carriers in RJ's and some still have props on them. It only took U going to bankruptcy and removing 1/2 of the fleet for them to possibly realize they were losing money into these cities.

Could some other carrier move in and take some of the share? Sure, but some of the cities still do not have loads to justify putting more than 1-2 flights a day in there with anything more than 38 seats...