It took more than 6 years to get here, but this post is my 2,000th. And on those 2,000 posts, you’ve left more than 33,333 comments. That’s a lot of words. So I thought I would look back at some of the things I blogged about during that first month in August 2006. Posts were more frequent and a lot shorter back then.

• Delta re-built its LAX hub with Mexico regional jet flights.
• The number of checked bags soared thanks to the liquid ban going into effect and early feedback was positive because of how few carry-ons there were.
• Boeing shut down its Connexion inflight internet service.
• JetBlue CEO David Neeleman wanted to power his planes with coal.
• MAXjet announced flights from London to Vegas.
• I wrote up a trip report from a trip to Indianapolis on the newly-merged US Airways.
• United killed its short-lived regional jet hub in San Antonio.

It’s fun to look back on the first 2,000 posts. If you all keep reading, I look forward to 2,000 more.

Delta recently sent around a PDF file internally talking about the airline’s Africa service, and a Delta employee sent it over to me. I thought it was a really interesting look at how African markets require doing things a bit differently. Today, Delta serves Dakar (Senegal), Accra (Ghana), Monrovia (Liberia), Lagos (Nigeria), and Johannesburg (South Africa). I’ve uploaded the PDF here so you can read it, but here are some highlights.

• Africa is a hugely challenging market with high startup costs. For example, Delta built dedicated gates in Accra with KLM for their flights. In Monrovia, they actually built a new terminal with Air France. Among the amenities… air conditioning. Sounds like we’re talking very basic facilities. Then again, the Delta customers who have to fly through this thing will be pretty jealous…



• Delta set up a “Delta Energy Desk” dedicated reservations line just for the energy market in Ghana. I asked Delta spokesperson Olivia Cullis why that was, and she said that Delta people in Ghana thought it would be helpful since that is a big up-and-coming market that can use special attention. So far, they’re happy with what it has done for the airline.
• About 90 percent of the people who fly Delta to Africa are of African descent, though of course many are coming from the US.
• The airline had to tweak meals to have a local flavor. For example, flight attendants serve more fruit juice and less soda. They also have rice instead of pasta.
• Delta created “Protocol” service for BusinessElite travelers coming out of Accra and Lagos. This clearly seems like it’s an effort to get Delta’s best customers through the sometimes challenging (to say the least) airport environments in those places.
• Delta is developing a GPS approach for Monrovia to make things safer and more reliable there.

It’s a quick read but it’s worth a look to see what Delta has done to try to make Africa work. Again, you can read the Winning in Africa pamphlet from Delta here.

Remember when Southwest announced it was taking over AirTran and people immediately thought Delta was in trouble in Atlanta? Hah. Yeah, right. I’d say the opposite is true. Delta must absolutely love Southwest for how much it has cut back Atlanta so far.

Southwest didn’t complete its purchase of AirTran until May 2011, and the first joint schedule wasn’t released until travel for September of that year. For that reason, I decided to take the summer 2011 schedule in Atlanta, before the changes, and compare it to the recently-released summer 2013 schedule. I looked at a Wednesday in the middle of July and the results are quite clear. Southwest has put a serious dent in AirTran’s Atlanta schedule.

Southwest and AirTran combined in 2013 will operate 12 percent fewer departures than AirTran alone did in 2011. (Southwest didn’t start serving Atlanta until well after.) AirTran had 211 Wednesday departures back then, but the combined airline will have 185 next summer.

Probably more staggering is the number of cities that have lost service completely. In fact, the combined airline has cut the number of nonstop destinations from Atlanta by 20 percent. Southwest/AirTran will serve only 45 destinations next summer while AirTran served 56 back in 2011. And those 45 destinations include 4 new Southwest ones. That means Southwest has ditched 15 AirTran destinations. (The most recent, Wichita, was just announced recently.) Take a look at the carnage via this Great Circle Mapper map.

The red lines go to the 15 cities that had nonstop service on AirTran in 2011 but will be losing it by next summer. The blue lines are the four airports that weren’t in the schedule in 2011 but will be next summer.

So has Southwest grown anywhere? Sure. It did add new service to Austin and Louisville. It also added 4 new flights to Baltimore along with 2 new flights to Vegas, Chicago/Midway, and Memphis. There was also 1 additional flight each to Akron/Canton, Ft Lauderdale, Houston/Hobby, Pittsburgh, Richmond, St Louis, and Tampa. In other words, most of the growth has been to Southwest strongholds. And that’s not a surprise. (I don’t count Norfolk as growth since it basically replaced 4 Newport News flights with 3 in Norfolk. And Aruba was an AirTran destination that just wasn’t served on Wednesdays back then.)

We also have to think about seat count growth. As those 717s are replaced by 737s, each flight will end up having more seats onboard. So there is growth in existing markets just by changing aircraft types. But there are a lot of markets left with nothing.

As you can imagine, Delta has to be enjoying this. It serves 13 of the 15 cities that AirTran/Southwest ditched, so it has to love what’s happening on those routes. (The other two are Atlantic City and Branson.) At the same time, Delta is going from competing with an airline that has First Class and seat assignments to one that doesn’t. It’s also facing a Southwest/AirTran that will have higher costs than what AirTran had on its own. That means fares have to be higher for Southwest to make money.

Yes, it’s mostly a good news story for Delta. Southwest is slowly turning Atlanta into a very different kind of city in its network compared to what it was in the AirTran network. Here’s the breakdown of daily departures by airport, for those who are curious. (The 2011 numbers came from masFlight, but I used Southwest/AirTran schedules for 2013 data.)

[Edit 11/27 @ 238p PT to add changes in seats to the table]

It wasn’t long ago that I was writing about how it was going to get a lot more comfortable to fly on Delta thanks to the retirement of small regional jets in favor of larger airplanes. Now, we’re looking at the same type of transformation at United, with one big caveat.

The United pilots are about to begin voting on a new agreement that would change the landscape of regional operations to look a lot like what we see at Delta today. I’m not kidding. They’ve almost copied the Delta contract entirely in this area. Of course, none of this matters if they shoot down the contract but we’ll know in a couple weeks.

As a traveler, you should be hoping for this to pass because it will mean a better flying experience. Here’s a visual summary:

Now to translate that into English.

At the beginning of this year, United had 555 regional aircraft flying as United Express. Of those, 347 were 50-seat aircraft (ERJ-145, CRJ-200, and Q300 turboprops). On the bigger side, the current count is 183 including the CRJ-700, the EMB-170, and the Q400 turboprop. This makes up the group of what we’ll call 70-seat aircraft. The rest of the fleet is made up of smaller props like the Embraer 120.

In this new agreement, the focus is on 76-seat aircraft. Today, United has no airplanes in the 76-seat range, but that will change in this new contract beginning in 2014. That means the airline can introduce the CRJ-900 or EMB-175 into the fleet.

In 2014, there can be up to 255 regional aircraft with more than 50 seats. The Q400 props are included in that number. Of those, 130 can have 76 seats. In 2016, the total number doesn’t change, but the number that can be 76-seaters goes up from 130 to 153, the same number Delta has today.

So what does this mean? It means that with 183 aircraft in the 70-seat range today, there will be only 72 more big regionals in terms of number of airplanes. But some of the existing 70-seaters can be converted into 76-seaters.

There are also some restrictions on how these airplanes can be used. For example, eighty percent of regional flying has to be under 900 miles. And no more than 5 percent of flying in hub-to-hub markets can be on aircraft operated by regional airlines. United also can’t just start random regional jet hubs since 90 percent of regional flights must be in large United stations.

While there doesn’t seem to be a realistic cap on 50-seaters at this point, that doesn’t mean there won’t be a change. It’s widely expected that United will be reducing that fleet significantly, by well over 100. Restrictions to the 50-seat category don’t kick in until 2016 when the big changes may start to occur. The expectation is, in fact, that we’ll see about 200 of the 50-seaters go away by that point. Thank goodness.

How We Get There
The road here is full of questions. Delta made a deal with its pilots to bring on a fleet of 88 Boeing 717s that it acquired from AirTran. Because Delta brought those airplanes onboard to be flown by Delta pilots, the pilots agreed to allow an additional 70 of the 76-seat aircraft to be operated by regionals.

United doesn’t have a plane operating in that size range, but the pilots want one. And more importantly, the pilots want to be the ones flying the airplane for United instead of a regional carrier. This is an important thing for the pilots because it draws a line in the sand claiming the currently un-served 90-100 seat market as their own. It prevents regional expansion.

So how will they do that? Beginning in 2016, if United adds airplanes flown by its own pilots in the 90-100 seat range, then it will gain the right to add up to 70 more 76-seat regionals, up to 223 total. That would match Delta’s contract. Specifically, these must be either Bombardier CS100s or Embraer 190/195s per the contract.

That is a big “if” since United doesn’t have to add any of these airplanes. If it doesn’t, then it won’t get any more big regional aircraft.

For United to max out its number of 76-seaters at 223, the airline will have to bring on at least 88 of the new 90-100 seaters. At that point, the 70-seaters will be capped at 102. There won’t be a restriction on aircraft smaller than that. Does this sound familiar? It should, because United would look identical to Delta.

The upshot here is that if the contract is approved, we can look forward to a lot fewer 50-seaters and more 76-seaters. And if United so chooses, we’ll see new airplanes in the 90-100 seat range operated by United pilots. That’s good news for everyone, if it happens.

The EU’s Airplane Carbon Trading Program and What It Means – Conde Nast Daily Traveler
I took a look at the recently-suspended emissions trading system in Europe and the politics behind it.

Holiday travel and tighter planes raise likelihood of having larger seatmates – Cleveland Plain Dealer
I was asked to comment on another article about passengers who can’t fit in one seat.