Think a Lot of People are Using Wifi In the Air? Think Again – BNET
Runway Girl Mary Kirby caught on to some numbers that AirCell mentioned regarding onboard wifi usage. They’re pretty low.

Hey Los Angeles: Customers Pay for Airports Improvements Regardless of How They’re Structured – BNET
The LA City Council just voted to support an increase in the Passenger Facility Charge. That comes straight out of your pocket, and it’s not a great idea.

US Airways Adds Cash for the Next Couple Winters, Defers Airplanes – BNET
Yes, US Airways has done it again. They’ve played with the cash gods and walked away with more in their pocket. This time it’s mostly expense reduction via aircraft delays.

Labor Issues Thwart Southwest’s Efforts to Buy Frontier – BNET
Southwest lost its chance to buy Frontier thanks to labor issues. It shouldn’t be a surprise, but it still is.

LAX Rent Increase Ruled Not Discriminatory, But Fight Continues – BNET
LAX tried to increase its rent for those airline not under long term lease, and they just won the first round of the battle. But there’s more to come.

In Search of the Elusive Power Port – NileGuide
I wrote this guest post for NileGuide about which airlines have power outlets and where you can find them. It ain’t easy.

Air Traffic Controller Union, FAA Agree on Labor Deal – BNET
It’s taken years, but the new administration has finally started working with the air traffic controllers. They have a tentative agreement.

June Premium Traffic Drops “Only” 21.3 Percent – BNET
It’s premium traffic monitor time again, and it’s ugly . . . again. But things are getting a bit less bad.

Delta’s Partnership with Virgin Blue Causes Pain for United in Australia – BNET
Virgin Blue is walking away from its United codeshare down under.

Volaris is now flying a single daily trip from LAX to Toluca (outside Mexico City) and another one to Guadalajara. They’ll be starting flights to those cities from Oakland as well, and at the press conference yesterday, Volaris Managing Director and CEO Enrique Beltranena (bottom left in the picture, though I’ll certainly understand if you’re distracted by those flight attendants) announced that they had just received approval to fly from Oakland to Tijuana as well. He also said that he expects Volaris to be flying to more than 10 cities in the US in the next two and a half years. So this is no small plan.

How the heck are they planning on being the first successful low cost carrier flying between the US and Mexico? A huge part of the plan is the Southwest codeshare that was announced earlier. In fact, it’s such a large part of the plan that Kyle O’Neil, Southwest’s Director of Alliances (the tall, white dude in the middle of the picture) was there at the podium today for the event.

Of course, the question on my mind was whether or not the codeshare was still proceeding as planned, especially considering that the WestJet deal had been delayed. So, I asked them to elaborate on details. Kyle said that Southwest was still planning to launch the codeshare in 2010, but he couldn’t announce a date. Original plans were for the codeshare to go on sale in early 2010, so this looks like there might be a little slippage in my mind. But Kyle reiterated that they were very committed to the partnership, something that was evident by his mere presence at the event.

For Volaris, I imagine the codeshare can’t start soon enough. They are coming off a disastrous traffic plunge in Mexico following the swine flu outbreak that began in April. Enrique admitted that Volaris has been suffering, but he said that he believes Volaris was the only airline in Mexico to be breakeven over the last six months. (Warning: He answered that question in Spanish, so I’m trusting that my Spanish skills haven’t failed me.)

In the end, Enrique presented a very nice plaque (at left) to LAX commemorating the start of their service. He said that they’ve presented this to each city they fly as a symbol that they intend to be there for a long time. I like the symbolism.

So Volaris is pushing ahead, and LAX is a huge part of their commitment to making flying in the US work. They will be flying out of Terminal 2 here at LAX (convenient since Northwest flights all moved to Delta’s terminal yesterday), and while it’s not going to provide connections behind security to Southwest, it will at least be right next door.

What might you expect to see onboard? If you’re looking for legroom, you won’t find much. I’m told their A319s are equipped with 144 seats while the A320s have 172. For comparison, JetBlue’s spacious configuration has only 150 seats on an A320, but I think Volaris’ configuration makes sense for the airline. They do have leather seats and overhead TV screens, so the product is still quite nice. (You can see a photo of the inside of their aircraft on airliners.net.)

Perhaps the most interesting thing offered by Volaris is unique in this industry. As Enrique said (to many laughs), “We guarantee on-time performance or your money back so I hope your airport delivers.” That’s right. If your flight is late by more than 30 minutes, you get your money back, regardless of the reason for the delay. As a marketing campaign, I love this idea. It will certainly stand out and it’s a huge differentiator. On the other hand, remember why Domino’s dropped their 30 minute guarantee? They had drivers getting in accidents because they were rushing to beat the deadline. I really hope we don’t see any pressure on pilots to beat the deadline here. That makes me a little nervous.

Overall, it was a good event at LAX. Enrique seems like a very smart man, and he’s already built an airline that not only has to be the frontrunner of the low cost carriers in Mexico, but is also a great place to work. In fact, the biggest smile I saw from him all day was the one he let out when he was introduced as leading an airline that has been recognized as one of the top places to work in Mexico.

Would I try them if I were heading down to Mexico? Absolutely. And the low fares that they’re trying to bring into the market should help them stimulate additional traffic, assuming the burdensome taxes don’t overwhelm their efforts. I tend to think this can work, but this is not exactly the ideal time to be trying it. Still, they pushing ahead at full speed.

So what’s next for Volaris? Well, there was some pressure from LA officials for the airline to start service to Ontario as well (which is operated by the same folks that run LAX), but Enrique responded that “there is nothing more we would like to do than start service to Ontario. So if we are able to, and you are able to reduce the cost of the airport . . . .” Ah, smart man. Keep an eye on these guys, and if you have the chance to fly them, let me know your impressions.

Allegiant is a very simple operation. They will be basing two aircraft here at LAX and those planes will usually each do a morning roundtrip to some far flung destination followed by a second roundtrip in the afternoon every day of the week. That’s right. They’ll serve twelve destinations from LAX with only two airplanes, but that’s normal for these guys.

Allegiant doesn’t try for business traffic. They just want to bring leisure travelers to a destination, and in this case that destination is Southern California. It’s cheap (some flights for as low as $39 each way), but you have to fly on their terms. Make sure you pay attention to all the extra fees – almost nobody escapes without paying more – but it’s still a really good deal overall. Each destination will be served only two or three times per week. Here’s the rollout schedule:

Starting:
May 1 – Grand Junction (Colorado) on Monday/Friday
May 1 – Medford (Oregon) on Monday/Friday
May 2 – Bellingham (Washington – near the Canadian border) on Monday/Wednesday/Saturday
May 2 – Missoula (Montana) on Wednesday/Saturday
May 3 – Monterey (California) on Tuesday/Thursday/Sunday
May 3 – Springfield/Branson (Missouri) on Thursday/Sunday
May 22 – Billings (Montana) on Tuesday/Friday
May 23 – Fargo (North Dakota) on Tuesday/Saturday
May 23 – Sioux Falls (South Dakota) on Wednesday/Saturday
May 23 – Wichita (Kansas) on Wednesday/Saturday
May 24 – Des Moines (Iowa) on Thursday/Sunday
May 24 – McAllen (Texas) on Thursday/Sunday

It will be very interesting to see how United/American/Alaska react to direct competition on routes they fly nonstop. Scratch that – there really isn’t much competition here, but will it be perceived that way? Those United and American flights from Monterey to LAX are there mostly to feed other flights and not for local traffic. This thrice weekly flight on Allegiant really won’t take much traffic from the existing airlines but rather stimulate new traffic. It’s a little different in Medford where Horizon gets local traffic, but it still won’t be much competition with only two flights a week. Of course, Alaska (Horizon’s parent) has shown that it is all for strong reactions when threatened lately (right, Virgin America?), so there’s no guarantee they will ignore this either.

Another interesting thing is what you find when you pick through the schedules to look for holes. When a plane goes to Monterey on Tuesday, Thursday, and Sunday, it looked like it was sitting on the ground for more than four hours. A little more digging shows that Allegiant is squeezing in a roundtrip down to San Diego from Monterey before it comes back to LAX again. Same thing goes for flights to Grand Junction, but from there the plane is just going back to Vegas, probably so they can swap aircraft through the system.

Also, one of the airplanes has a gaping hole on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday afternoons. The plane arrives back at LAX at 140p on Monday, 235p on Tuesday, 355p on Wednesday, and 135p on Friday and does nothing else for the rest of the day. Something tells me they could launch another route or two in the not-too-distant future. There’s no reason for that plane to sit idle.

One more thing. If you’re trying to put the schedules together yourselves, you may have a little trouble until you realize that the Wednesday and Saturday flights to Bellingham are actually flown by an airplane based in Bellingham and not one of the LAX planes. That’s how they can squeeze out an extra morning flight on those days.

Allegiant will use Terminal 6 at LAX, and they won’t need a ton of space. In fact, the flights are scattered so that this entire thing can be operated from only one gate. So, welcome to LAX, Allegiant. We look forward to seeing you bring many pasty white Midwesterners here to spend money and help us out of our budget hole.

• Bellingham (Washington)
• Billings (Montana)
• Des Moines (Iowa)
• Fargo (North Dakota)
• Grand Junction (Colorado)
• McAllen (Texas)
• Medford (Oregon)
• Missoula (Montana)
• Monterey (California)
• Sioux Falls (South Dakota)
• Springfield (Missouri)
• Wichita (Kansas)

My initial thought was that it would be San Diego, but that was proven wrong when the airport manager in Sioux Falls let it slip that it would be to the LA area. At that point, I figured Allegiant would try the currently empty San Bernardino Airport since those guys would likely pay Allegiant to fly there. But recently, I learned that LAX would actually be the chosen airport.

This surprises me, and not for the reasons you might think. Allegiant has shown that it isn’t afraid of flying to larger airports. Obviously Las Vegas is one, but they’ve also recently ventured on to routes like Bellingham to Oakland and San Diego. As long as there’s a smaller airport on one end, it shouldn’t be an issue.

What does surprise me is that flying out of LAX means they’ll be entering routes that already have nonstop service. Monterey is served by United and American and Medford is served by Horizon. Allegiant historically has not liked to go head to head with other airlines, so this is an interesting move, assuming it proves to be true.

There’s no question that bringing people from small towns to LA a couple times a week could be a lucrative business, and I think there’s a very good chance that Allegiant can be successful with this move. Their unique model has shown that it can work with a handful of tweaks to it, and I don’t see why this tweak won’t be successful. I will, however, be closely watching those towns with competing nonstop service to see if the incumbent airlines feel the need to respond or not. That will probably make or break those routes.

The best part of this whole thing? It’s usually $25 for three hours, but they’ve recently introduced a $10 rate for one hour or $35 for five hours as well. That’s a great deal, especially since it includes free wi-fi, something that still costs you in the rest of the airport.

The only problem for this particular lounge? It’s not behind security. So, if you’re catching a flight at Bradley, you’ll still have to cut out a little early to beat the lines. Johnny Jet and I were both touring together, and we both suggested to the lounge manager that he be constantly posting current security wait times. He seemed to like the idea, so hopefully that will make time management easier.

But the good news here is that if you have a long layover in any other terminal, you can come on by and use the lounge. With the great views and free wifi, it’s probably the best place to kill some time in the airport considering the price.

I hope you all have easy travels this year, but from the looks of the weather map, that’s not going to happen for a lot of you. Just hold on and remember that things will be great once you finally get there.

[See all my pictures of the lounge on Flickr]

As you can see, it will ultimately add two concourses to the Bradley Terminal with a host of other stuff in there as well. Fentress Architects, the same people that did Denver’s airport, came up with the design, and they were at the reception to explain to everyone how it took the LA environment into account and incorporated the ocean, the mountains, etc. They even said, and I swear I’m not making this up, that they’re trying to change “LAX into LA-Wow.” Now I’m the first to admit that I’m not a design kind of guy, but I suppose I understand what they were trying to do. My problem is that they shouldn’t have been trying to do it.

We heard a lot from Roger Johnson, Deputy Executive Director of LAWA and head of this project, about how this is going to be an airport that people talk about. It’s going to be an airport that when people arrive, they tell their friends and family that they have to go see it. Who the heck cares? I want an airport that’s easy. I don’t care if it’s pretty. If you go for “pretty,” you end up wasting money (at least $6 or 7 billion in this case) on something that ultimately either leads to higher airfares or loss of flights because it’s too expensive to fly there. To make it a little more clear what they’re trying to do, I’ve gone back to Google Maps. First up we have the plans for Phase I.

So, in the first phase, they’re going to build a new concourse to replace the existing one at the Bradley Terminal. The north side will open in Jan 2012 with the south side opening in July of that year. They’re staggered because of the way they need to knock down the old one to keep enough gates operating during construction. You will notice that the current A380 gate on the north side will actually stick around after this is done because it’s grandfathered in and can’t be replaced.

They will also replace the two side security areas with one large one in the middle of the existing facility. All of this should be completed by September 2013 with a price tag of around $2 billion. That’s right. We get 14 gates, 3 more than before, along with a new fire station and some taxiway changes for a mere $2 billion. Keep in mind that JetBlue built an entirely new terminal in New York with 26 gates for $800 million (though they didn’t have to move taxiways around). This money is all being spent on what Roger Johnson admitted was an “expensive concept.”

But the absurdity really doesn’t begin until Phase II. This part hasn’t been funded yet, but it is expected to cost $3 to 4 billion. (I’ll put money down that the costs double by the time it’s done.) Here’s my map of the second phase.

As you can see, they will now build an additional concourse further to the west. The parking lots for Terminals 3/4 will now be razed and replaced with a new “Central Terminal Area” to serve the midfield concourse. There will be underground parking (and the TSA is ok with this?) to replace the existing parking lots. An above ground people mover (high enough to accommodate an A380 underneath) will connect the CTA, existing Bradley, and the new midfield concourse. But the most shocking thing is that the CTA will only serve the midfield concourse while the existing Bradley terminal will continue to have its own check in area. My head hurts.

And the best part of all? This will not expand the number of gates on property. Thanks to an ill-advised agreement with the surrounding communities, the number of gates is fixed at the airport, so they’ll just close down the remote gates at the far west end of the airport when these new ones open.

Oh, I almost forgot to mention. There’s a separate project that has yet to be funded that will put a people mover around the airport and connect it out to the parking lots and metro rail. I like that idea, but I hate the idea of spending what will likely exceed $10 billion on a project that could be done for far less if we weren’t trying to dazzle the world.

In my opinion, we could ditch the fancy design and put function over form here. Yes, I’d like to see a nice open airport with lots of light, but does it need to have a roof that looks like waves of the ocean? I would say not. I’d much rather have the user fees stay lower so that we can attract more service. Don’t get me wrong, there are some great things happening in this project that should certainly be happening, such as . . .

• Sterile connectors between Terminal 3, 4, and Bradley will be built so that travelers don’t have to leave security to get between them all. I wish we would see more connectors like that built all around the airport so connections could flow more freely.




• There will be far better shopping and dining options at Bradley. I realize that’s not hard to do since it’s pretty much devoid of everything behind security now, but this is a big deal in terms of passenger convenience.




• This project eliminates the need to use the remote gates. Amen.




• The new concourse will give more space between Bradley and T3 on one side and T4 on the other. That means that planes from each terminal will be able to push back simultaneously and taxi out without having to take turns waiting for the other side to go. This will be a huge productivity gainer for the airport and especially for American and Alaska which sit on the other side of this alleyway.




• They say they’ll redo the customs and immigration facilities so you no longer have to push your heavy luggage up a ramp after you get through the process. There is nothing like watching someone who is exhausted after 12 hours on a plane have to push their luggage up.

If just those things alone were fixed, you’d see a significant increase in user satisfaction at the airport. I’ll say it again, I think the design looks good, but we don’t need a good-looking design to be a functional airport. The more money that gets spent, the more that has to come out of passenger pockets down the line.

See more pictures from the reception

You might recall that LAX moved out a few airlines on the east side of Terminal 3 so that Virgin America could come in and fix up some of the oldest non-renovated terminal space at the airport. This is actually a very good example of how a little money (maybe $5 to 7 millionit was $2.5 million or so?) can go a long way toward improving the passenger experience. When it’s done, there will be better seating, better lighting, and I’ve heard they’re even discussing turning the former outdoor smoking lounge in the middle of the terminal into a nice patio restaurant. Oh, and they old sports grill is already being replaced with a Gladstone’s local seafood restaurant. In addition, they’ve pushed the ticket counters further back so that there’s more queuing space without sending people out the door.

When I contrast this with the multi-billion dollar project LAX is putting together for the Bradley terminal (I’ll have that one this week as well since I went to a reception discussing the project), I have to shake my head. This is the right way to be improving the passenger experience in a terminal that was formerly not in good shape at all. Whether Virgin America should be spending the money on this kind of thing is highly debatable (there are better uses for a cash-strapped airline), but I still like the frugality of the project.

See a few still shots on the inside

Updated 12/12 @ 1030a to reflect actual cost of the project