It would figure that an extremely busy week for me would also be a busy news week in the airline world. Though I’ve tried to avoid these short summaries lately, there’s just too much going on for me to do it any other way today. Unfortunately, most of these stories involve angry passengers, long delays, wastes of money, and other things that just make you want to avoid traveling. *sigh*

Delta Airlines, Hypocrite of the Week - PlaneBuzz notes that Delta really had some balls this week by putting out two conflicting press releases on the same day. The first whined about all the air traffic control delays and called for reform. Right afterwards, they announced they were adding MORE flights out of JFK. I’m planning on doing a more in-depth piece on JFK next week. The airport is melting down in the midst of Delta’s insane flight buildup. On beautifully clear days, you’re still looking at long delays. It’s so bad, I would recommend avoiding the airport, yet Delta thinks there’s room for more. Nice work.

Anger Over Apple Juice - As bad as the delays are getting, passengers still need to find a way to control their anger. This flight actually was in the air when someone freaked out about not getting a drink quickly enough and they diverted. As far as I’m concerned, the airline should be charging that guy for the extra costs involved. Now some reports say it was a little kid which makes me wonder if it was Pearl, from Will Ferrell’s epic sketch, The Landlord, embedded below. (Click here if you can’t see it.)

Aloha Means Hello AND Goodbye - One place where we aren’t seeing any delays right now is in Hawai’i, but there are other problems there. The addition of go! to the state’s skies continues to cause huge problems for everyone. Really, nobody is making money out there right now, and nobody is doing worse than Aloha. In its first quarter, the airline lost just over $24m on revenue of only $88m. This is an airline that just came OUT of bankruptcy. This explains why they’ve recently tied up with United. They make United’s financials look good.

NIMBYs First, Safety Second - In yet another step forward for people who moved into the area long after the airport was there, a bill was introduced in Congress to prohibit LAX from separating its two runways on the north side. What do I think? Boooooooo!!!! This is a case where trying to improve the safety of the airport (as they’ve done on the south runways already) is considered to be unimportant compared to the needs of a handful of residents who moved there long after the airport existed. That’s what you get when you move in near an airport. Deal with it.

Gimme My Balls Back - Apparently, eBay gave away some stress balls during its conference, but since the balls contained liquid they weren’t allowed to go through security. I have two thoughts on this. 1) Our security policy is dumb and 2) eBay is dumb for not thinking about that before handing them out. Oh well.

Rockford Airport Gets the Waste of Money Award - As a taxpayer, I’m pissed. Rockford Airport has been subsidizing United Airlines flights to Denver from the city. The agreement is that every flight is guaranteed $7,000. If it makes less, the airport will make up the difference. So far this year, they’ve spent $2.3m on it! The subsidies are apparently so successful that they’re going to extend them. What?!? How is that successful? Yeah, the flights are full, but they’re clearly not making money if you have to drop that much cash. Now if these were local funds, I wouldn’t care, but $1m of that is coming from the feds and that comes out of all our pockets. And this for an airport that’s only 70 miles away from Chicago/O’Hare. These subsidies can’t go on forever. Just give up now and let airlines serve the airport that can make it work on their own (like Allegiant, which serves three cities from Rockford and gets no subsidies). Just think what kind of air traffic control system we could build if the feds stopped funding flights like these.

I know, it sounds funny, right? You never think of Southwest needing a turnaround plan, but yesterday that appears to be exactly what they presented to Wall Street. Why? Well, in the past they were able to hide some of their problems thanks to their excellent fuel hedges. But as those expire, they’ve seen their profits plunge.

On the left, you’ll see a chart from today’s presentation to illustrate the problem. See the whole presentation here (pdf).

Now don’t worry, Southwest-lovers. Even though that drop looks nasty, they still made $93m last quarter, something most airlines would drool over, but it’s not as good as it used to be and Southwest needs to fix things so they stop leaving money on the table.

So what exactly are they doing?

First, as I noted last week, they trimmed their schedule up. Robert Stack did a great job of finding almost all of the routes that were disappearing. He only missed the ever-popular Midland/Odessa to El Paso route. (Looks like a long 292 mile drive through nothingness for the 2 people who used to fly that route.)

But of course, with schedule cuts, they have to put those planes somewhere. Yesterday, we found out where. The airline has decided to bump up service in both Denver and New Orleans with these extra planes. New Orleans residents will be thrilled to get some service back. Southwest has taken an awfully long time to bring their schedule back up there since Katrina. The city will see the return of three daily flights to Birmingham (Alabama) along with an extra flight to Dallas/Love, Las Vegas, and Orlando. Houston/Hobby will get two more flights.

Denver is a different story. That’s a fairly new market for them and there had been rumors that flights hadn’t been doing as well as they’d hoped. Well, they’re definitely throwing everything in there to see if it will stick. The city will get new flights to Albuquerque, Austin, Seattle, Oklahoma City, and Amarillo. Wait . . . Oklahoma City and Amarillo? Ah yes. Thanks to the wonders of the remains of the Wright Amendment, they’re using those flights to be the single stop without plane change service to Dallas/Love. And by the way, Salt Lake and Nashville will each get one more flight on top of what they already have.

There are other increases and decreases as well. If you’d like to dig in and see all the schedule changes for this year, Southwest provided this handy PDF with all the changes. Going forward, they’re slowing long term growth too. Next year instead of taking 34 planes, they’ll only increase their fleet by 19. That may mean fewer deliveries or they may retire/return some older aircraft.

Beyond schedule, what else are they doing?

This press release sums it up broadly, but it’s very vague. I really want to know more.

The first thing that jumped out at me was “Unveil a new boarding/seating method.” Booooooo! I like the cattle car boarding (demonstrated at right, thanks to Leia). It certainly helped America West create the best commercial they’ve ever aired (here (wmv)). But what I really like is that no matter when I book my ticket, I know that I can logon 24 hours before and get an A boarding pass. With an A, I can get my window even if I’m the last one on in that group, and that’s great.

Business travelers never have to worry about paying a ton at the last minute and getting stuck in the middle. It’s the great equalizer. Of course, we don’t know what they’re thinking about doing here, but I’m hoping it’s not too bad.

They also say they’re going to “Enhance its low-fare structure.” Riiiiiight. The goal is to make it more business-traveler friendly, so maybe more refundable fares? What scares me is that I foresee a change fee being implemented. Probably only $25, but that would significantly change the Southwest experience. Any time I see the word “enhance,” alarm bells start going off in my head.

UPDATE 6/28 @ 941a: This AdWeek article describes one of the ads that Southwest is about to roll out. I quote, “two businessmen trapped in a traffic jam offer the cab driver money to get them to the airport on time. After a careening around various urban perils, one asks the other, ‘Is this worth it?’ His partner replies, ‘It’s still cheaper than a change fee if we miss our flight.’” So it sounds like they’re planning to remain change fee-free!

Oh, and they want to “Enhance its Rapid Rewards frequent flyer program.” Again, I get scared. They did customer research that said people wanted a more competitive program. I’m sure that means more destination options. People like to use their miles to go internationally. So that would be great if they do something along those lines, but as usual it will also end up coming with some more restrictions, I’m sure. The name of the game is increasing revenues, so . . . .

To sum it up, the airline wants to find a way to generate more money without destroying what Southwest stands for, and that’s not easy. Catering more to business travelers can help. So will sellling ancillary services like onboard internet and even *gasp* buy on board food products. But they’re going to become a different kind of airline as they continue to find ways to grow. We don’t know much yet, but we can only cross our fingers and hope they don’t blow it.

I know I’ve written about this in the past, but I continue to be amazed at the insanely large number of airline customer service surveys that come out. We have the Wichita St guys doing one, the University of Michigan guys doing another, and JD Power as well.

Today, Maritz Research joined the crowd saying . . . absolutely nothing exciting.

The money quote? That’d be from the director of consulting and strategic implementation at Maritz. “Competing on price is no longer an option for airlines.” Oh really? I’m sure you know best. It’s been shown time and again that price and schedule are really the two main drivers of ticket purchases. Everything else is secondary. So, you’re not going to see them stopping to compete on price any time soon, at least as long as consumers keep shopping that way.

So what did Maritz suggest? Well, the results say that airlines should add a “family section” to their planes and they should make sure they don’t allow cell phones. There has to be more than that, right?

Well, they say that 63% of people are willing to pay for extra legroom and 42% are willing to pay more for food. As far as legroom goes, some people are willing to pay extra for it. That’s why United still has Economy Plus. But when American tried to put more legroom on the whole plane, they couldn’t make it work and reversed the decision. The biggest problem with this survey? Well, just for starters, it’s too simple. How much would more would people pay? Remember, if someone is going to pay a small amount more for more legroom, there’s a decent chance that won’t make up for the lost revenue from having to remove seats from the plane. And it gets a lot more complicated than that.

Going back to the food issue, if 42% of people are willing to pay more, then what’s wrong with a buy on board model? Don’t get me wrong, I hate those stupid snack boxes. But I like the buy on board options where they have fresh food. (Delta’s Song had great stuff.) If I’m hungry, I’ll buy it. If not, I won’t.

In the end, I don’t believe most of these surveys. There’s definitely a bias between what people say they’ll do and what they will do. If you’re taking a survey, sure you’ll say you’d pay for more legroom. But when it comes time to whip that credit card out, you’re still looking at the lowest fare.

Part of this can be blamed on the way airlines sell their products. When we had PriceGrabber Travel up and running, we showed you legroom on flights, but nobody else does that so how can customers even compare? If they could compare, how much more do you think they’d be willing to pay? And how is that impacted by frequent flier program loyalty? There are far more complicated questions that need to be answered to turn these surveys into something useful. They also need to review actual consumer behavior instead of just what people are saying they’ll do.

Unfortunately, most of the surveys we see coming out these days are just fluff and can’t really help effect change.

I just came across this discussion thread on airliners.net that shows the first 787 all put together!

That is one awesome-looking airplane. Check out the size of those engines on that frame. It almost looks like the love-child of a 777 and a 757. (Yes, I know that thinking about airplanes mating means I should see a shrink.)

I really don’t understand the obsession that Midwest Airlines has with dogs.

First, they launched a frequent flier program for them. Fine, that’s a good way to reach dog lovers and probably makes some sense. Then they announced Canine Travel Packs, a “welcome gift” for dogs when they fly. Mmmkay, starting to get creepy.

So yesterday, when they put out a press release entitled, “Midwest Airlines Pampers Professional Pooches,” I could only shake my head and wonder . . . why is the PR team focused on this when they might want to worry a little more about that hostile takeover from AirTran? Maybe they just need some good news to focus on - they haven’t had much of that lately - but pampered pooches?

Not that most of you care, but just in case . . . . That last release was about how they transported two “special canine athletes” from Florida to New York. That’s it. Nothing else. Oy vey.

I’d say this one falls in the “Why didn’t this happen before?” category. Last week, Delta announced that they’ve implemented the ability to book airline, hotel, and car rental from a single shopping cart. This is the first time I’ve seen it from a US airline, and it makes a lot of sense.

When I travel, I generally make airline reservations first. I’m not sure why, maybe I just think that there will always be enough hotel options at different rates while airline tickets could fluctuate so much that it could make or break the trip. So if I’m booking airline tickets first, that means the airline sites may have the first opportunity to sell me on hotels and car rentals.

Airlines have offered the ability to book hotels and car rentals for some time, but it’s not done well. The way it is now, when you book your ticket, you then have to do a completely separate search for hotels and pay separately. I’m not going to bother, because I can just go to other sites that I use frequently.

But now, as soon as you have your ticket reserved, Delta will show you hotels and car rentals before you buy the ticket. When you pick one, it puts it in the shopping cart with your ticket and you check out by entering your credit card only once. Online travel agents learned this was lucrative long ago. Any time you go to Orbitz, Expedia, or the like, you’ll notice they push you pretty hard to buy a vacation package. So why has it taken so long for the airlines to get onboard?

Who knows. But once again Delta is doing something smart online. I’m impressed to see them leading the pack with things like this, Siteseer, and the Change site (even if that implementation wasn’t done very well. Keep up the good work.

I wasn’t planning on posting again this week, but after seeing this, I thought it would be nice to end the week on a lighter note.

Check out the long list of titles you can select for yourself when registering for the British Airways Executive Club frequent flyer program. Some of the highlights include High Chief, Vice Admiral, Baron, Cardinal, and my personal favorite, Her Majesty.

Maybe it’s just me, but I’d hope they wouldn’t make the Queen go online to sign up for the program. Actually, I’m pretty sure the Queen wouldn’t earn miles when she decides to take her own BA plane for her travels. Oh, and they have “His Holiness” as well. Think the Pope has been on a BA flight lately?

This reminds me of what my brother does when he flies Southwest (the whole “title” thing, not taking a plane at will). Try making a reservation at southwest.com and you’ll see they give you a variety of suffixes you can use. Every time he flies, he uses CEO. More than once he’s had customer service agents comment on it, especially when he was in his early 20s with his long floppy hair wearing shorts and a t-shirt. As you can imagine, the agent think it’s hysterical.

Anyone else tried to use some of the more unique titles here? I’d be curious to see if they’d give you a hard time for it.

Ah, the UK. A great place to visit but a nightmare for airlines. The government just can’t keep its hands off the industry. In the last year, we’ve seen an expensive new green tax, a strict one-bag carry on limit, and now the possibility of no checked bags at all.

What?

Yep, I saw this article talking about the UK’s latest scheme to eliminate luggage from airports entirely, and sadly I was hardly surprised.

The plan would involve requiring people to ship their luggage before they travel. This would create a utopian airport with no checked bags and tons of happy people.

Yeah, right.

Where to start . . . how about the cost to the customer? There are some people that already offer this service. Luggage Express, for example, is planning to offer their “cost effective” solution. That’ll run you $70 per bag with a minimum of $85 per pickup. (Um, shouldn’t it just be $140 minimum, then?) The original article mentions First Luggage in the UK with rates starting at GBP49 (yes, that’s just about US$100). With economies of scale achieved from requiring everyone to ship their bags, they say it can be reduced to GBP20 (double that to make it US$40).

Now I’m sure there’s a market for $40 (at best) per bag service, but I’m not it. And I imagine there are a ton of others who aren’t either. So if you make me ship my bag ahead, I’m not going to be happy.

Then there are the logistics to this thing. Save the environment? Not with a huge fleet of delivery trucks clogging up the roads. And how early will they need to pick your bag up in order to have it at your destination? You may not be able to rely on last minute packing anymore.

Supporters say that airplanes not having to take on luggage would reduce the weight of the plane and therefore reduce the cost to fly for you. That could, according to the article, reduce the ticket price by GBP30 (US$60). I think we all know that’s not going to happen. Those savings won’t be passed on to consumers, so it’s not worth crossing your fingers.

Ultimately, the airlines need to decide how baggage should be handled, not the government. Many airlines have started to charge for baggage, and that’s fine with me. For a nominal $5 or $10 fee, I don’t mind. But if you’re going to require that I spend $40 just to bring a bag, it will be one more thing to push me away from flying, especially on a shorter flight where driving or taking a train is an option.

There’s yet another development in the ongoing daytime drama, “Days of our LAX.” This time, there’s trouble afoot for United. All those little 30 seat turboprops buzzing around California will no longer be able to nest in cozy Terminal 8. They’re being banished back to the old remote terminal.

I’ll get to the details as well as the history of this fight in a second, but first, thanks again to my high-tech graphics abilities, I’ve created an overlay on the Google Maps satellite of LAX to show you what’s going on here.

Pretty, isn’t it? (You don’t have to be so mean about it - drawing straight lines is hard.)

Anyway, as we all know by now, LAX has 9 terminals around the main horseshoe. Three on the north side, five on the south side, and the big Bradley International Terminal at the west end. Back in the day, airlines could use any planes they wanted to belly up to those gates, but that changed.

In the 1990s, space became tight. So the airport came to agreement with Delta and American (the biggest turboprop operators at the time) to put their props at remote gates so they could free up space in the main terminals. After Delta basically shed their entire commuter operation, United picked it up and until 2005, they also were at the remote gates.

As you can see on the map, American uses remote gates that are way on the left hand side. That’s actually right where their hangar is. Meanwhile, United used the little gates all the way in the bottom right corner. The gates are not exactly “chalets” or even remotely close. They’re cramped. And United’s terminal is far worse than American’s.

So in 2005, United, which had cut back its schedule so much in LA, decided to bring all the flights back into Terminal 8. That’s great news for passengers, but LAX was hardly happy about this. There is still a gate shortage and United was basically thought to be squatting on gates to prevent competition. The airport tried to kick them back but to no avail. That’s why you don’t see any planes around the remote terminal in this picture.

So yesterday, moving at the glacial pace we all know and love, it was finally ruled that United has to get those props out of there once again. No deadline was set, but it will be happening.

So what does this mean? (I ask that a lot.) If you fly on those little guys, it means back to the bus for you. You’ll no longer be able to walk to your plane. They’ll stick you in the cattle car and drive you over to the, um, flying cattle car. So you’ll need longer connecting times.

But what’s more interesting is to speculate about what it means for United’s terminals. They clearly don’t have enough flights to fill the terminals, and I can’t imagine they’ll be able to squat on the gates forever. (I may eat those words.) So what might they do with them? Personally, I’d love to see them bring Star Alliance partner US Airways over from Terminal 1. Then you could really improve connectivity and get US Airways out of that tight squeeze they have now. Of course, if you do that, you then cede US Airways’ old gates to Southwest and they’ll be able to expand quickly.

It’s never boring, that’s for sure. Uh, at least, it’s not boring for me.

It’s amazing what you can find by poking around Southwest’s website in the middle of the night. My friend Robert Stack, the Thanksgiving Traveler (aka King of Bumping), was playing around on the site and found that Southwest has started showing no availability for some flights beginning October 4, 2007. Now, there’s no way those flights are full already. This can only mean that Southwest is planning on pulling the flights out of the schedule entirely.

Ah, the long-speculated pullback in growth begins. So what did he find? Lots of long hauls are going away.

Twice daily flights from LAX to Baltimore and Philly are gone as are once daily flights to those airports from Oakland. Once daily flights from Orange County to Chicago/Midway and Phoenix to Cleveland are gone as well.

Other routes are just being cut back. Phoenix to Providence and Raleigh/Durham go from twice daily to once daily. Some shorter haul routes are affected as well. Houston to Austin and St Louis, Ft Lauderdale to Orlando, Islip to Baltimore and Chicago/Midway, Reno to Oakland and San Jose, and Phoenix to LAX all lose one daily flight.

You too can get in on the action. Just head on over to Southwest.com and plug in any two cities for a weekday flight after October 4. If you see it with no availability, it’s ready to be pulled. If you find any more, leave your comments below.