I’d like to welcome those of you who are visiting me for the first time thanks to my summer travel tips posted today on Nuts About Southwest. Take a look around, and if you like what you see, you can subscribe via RSS or email. Please jump in and join the conversation in the comments section while you’re here!

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After being ditched by ATA for that slutty bankruptcy court (I mean, who hasn’t been with her?), it looks like Southwest has found its next dance partner. The airline announced yesterday that it would begin codesharing with Canada’s WestJet next year. This is good news, but it’s more interesting as a symbol of what’s to come than anything else.

In short, nothing was really announced yesterday except for the intent to partner. In fact, it won’t happen for a long time. The release says that the “airlines plan to announce codeshare flight schedules and additional features regarding the partnership by late 2009.” So it’s a long way off.

When it does happen, you can probably expect a similar partnership as to what we saw with ATA back in the day. Interline baggage, frequent flier integration, and codesharing will all be part of this deal. What’s different?

Well, there is an interesting little bit noting that “southwest.com will soon become a distribution channel for WestJet’s existing Canadian and transborder flights, providing Customers the opportunity to purchase WestJet’s existing flights via southwest.com.” That IS interesting. So you’ll be able to book WestJet flights through Southwest’s website even if no Southwest flight is involved.

Not even the AirTran/Frontier partnership allows that. They still send you to the other airline’s site for booking. I suppose this seems closest to the Northwest/KLM arrangement. There is no KLM website in the US and there is no Northwest website in Europe. Then again, I doubt that WestJet will ditch their US site entirely.

This clearly seems like a win-win to me. For WestJet, it offers their flights on the most popular airline site in the US. I’m sure Southwest is getting a sweet commission deal out of this, so it’s good news for them as well. Nice little attempt at ancillary revenue, even if it is a pretty small opportunity. (Yeah Canada, I’m talking aboot you.)

So why is this so important? Well, as they mentioned in their blog post, Southwest’s exec team has spoken for years about how they wanted to be able to fly internationally. Though Canada barely counts, this indicates that Southwest now has (or will soon have) the booking capabilities set up to allow for international travel. I’d expect to see codesharing south of the border come up as well. Caribbean? Mexico? It’s coming. Europe? Maybe someday.

And that’s the really big news here. Southwest is no longer caged in the US. The airline is roaming free and is on the prowl.

You likely won’t be surprised to hear that I had a great time at the bachelor party this weekend, but that means I had very little time to write. So, since every travel blogger on earth has written about the announcement that Continental will be leaving SkyTeam, joining Star Alliance, and instituting a very tight partnership with United, I thought I’d just point to a couple of the more interesting posts I’ve seen.

Make no mistake, this is more than just a codeshare and frequent flier mile deal. Continental will join United, Lufthansa, and Air Canada in a joint venture for all transatlantic flying. Latin and Asia joint ventures will be developed as well. There will be broad systems integration as well.

In terms of routes, the rest of the Star Alliance will be happy to finally have a big international presence in New York. Dan Webb takes a look at route compatibility here.

If you’re a member of United’s Mileage Plus or Continental’s OnePass programs, this will certainly mean changes. Take a look at View From the Wing’s effort to breakdown what this may mean, despite the fact that we have very few details so far. His take? Well, it’ll be a good thing for Continental fliers, but it’s a little less clear for United loyalists.

We don’t know what this will mean for US Airways right now. Is three a crowd when it comes to the Star Alliance in the US? They say they aren’t going anywhere, but they also haven’t had talks with Continental about cooperation either. Could they partner with American now that CO/UA and DL/NW are getting together? Maybe. Or maybe they’ll try a different tactic, as Holly suggests here in PlaneBuzz.

For American fliers, this could be decent news as well. Strange, I know, but it could theoretically mean that getting antitrust immunity with British Airways would become easier, as Terri Maxon discusses on the Airline Biz blog.

There are a lot of different angles to this partnership with a ton of potential ramifications throughout the industry when it develops. I’ll keep you posted as I learn more.

There has been a ton of interesting news to write about in the last few days, and I’d been having trouble figuring out with what to lead . . . until yesterday. Turns out that I was voted one of the the world’s 50 most powerful blogs by The Observer in the UK.

Holy crap! That’s kind of scary. But, I’m guessing that means I’ll have a bunch of new visitors from that side of the Pond (welcome, everyone), so I’m going to post Sunday night instead of my usual Monday morning. And, while I’m being accommodating, let’s focus on something that probably causes you newbies pain and suffering more often than not: Heathrow.

Usually, any discussion of Heathrow involves a lot of cursing, rising blood pressure, and possibly some crying. With any luck, we’ll see less of that in the near future, but it’s likely to get worse in the short term. Why?

Well, we’re getting closer to the big terminal move. On March 27, BA will land its first flights at the brand-spanking new Terminal 5 and that begins a long period of transition for the airport as just about everyone save Virgin Atlantic moves locations.

I’ve tried to put together a handy guide on all the terminal moves so you can actually figure out where you’re supposed to go for your next flight. First, we’ll start with oneworld airlines, since they have the most changes happening the earliest.

	Flights	Current terminal	New terminal	When?
American	All flights	3	3	No change
British Airways	UK domestic flights	1	5	March 27, 2008
	European flights (except for Barcelona, Madrid, Lisbon, Nice and Helsinki), Tripoli, Johannesburg, Algiers, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Vancouver, Tokyo, Hong Kong	1/4	5
	Miami	3	5
	Warsaw	Heathrow	Gatwick
	Algiers	Gatwick	5	March 30, 2008
	Houston, Dallas	Gatwick	4
	New York/JFK, Abuja, Bangalore, Beijing, Cairo, Cape Town, Lagos, Phoenix	4	5	June 5, 2008
	Abu Dhabi, Accra, Bahrain, Baltimore, Buenos Aires, Chicago, Dallas, Dar es Salaam, Doha, Entebbe, Grand Cayman, Houston, Kuwait, Luanda, Lusaka, Mauritius, Mexico, Mumbai, Muscat, Nairobi, Nassau, Newark, Philadelphia, Providenciales, Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo, Tel Aviv, Toronto, Washington/Dulles	4	5	September 17, 2008
	Boston, Calgary, Chennai, Delhi, Denver, Dhaka, Dubai, Islamabad, Kolkata, Montreal, Seattle, Shanghai	4	5	October 22, 2008
	Barcelona, Helsinki, Lisbon, Madrid, Nice	1	3	January 27, 2009
	Bangkok, Singapore, Sydney	4	3	TBD
Cathay Pacific	All flights	3	3	No change
Finnair	All flights	1	3	January 27, 2009
Iberia	All flights	2	3
Japan Air Lines	All flights	3	3	No change
Qantas	All flights	4	3	Early 2009
Royal Jordanian	All flights	3	3	No change

Now let’s take a look at SkyTeam. In short, when Delta, Northwest, and Continental start flying to Heathrow in March, they’ll be in BA’s old Terminal 4. The rest of the carriers won’t move until early 2009, when a major terminal renovation will have been completed. Anyone who has flown BA out of that terminal lately knows that it is in desperate need of some help.

	Flights	Current terminal	New terminal	When?
Aeroflot	All flights	2	4	Early 2009
Air France	All flights	2	4	Early 2009
Alitalia	All flights	2	4	Early 2009
Continental	All flights	N/A	4	March 30, 2008
Czech	All flights	2	4	Early 2009
Delta	All flights	N/A	4	March 30, 2008
Kenya Airways	All flights	4	4	No change
KLM	All flights	4	4	No change
Korean	All flights	3	4	Early 2009
Northwest	All flights	N/A	4	March 30, 2008

I’d like to list the Star Alliance changes here as well, but I haven’t been able to find them. In fact, while oneworld and SkyTeam have been on top of the changes, Star Alliance has been silent. I sent the alliance a request and their response left me wondering if they actually meant to insult my intelligence or if they just don’t speak English very well.

We would like to inform you, however, that the Star Alliance is a network of 19 individual airlines. Operational matters are handled by the airlines themselves. Therefore, for more information, you will need to contact the individual Star Alliance member airlines directly.

Really? You guys aren’t an airline yourself? No sh**. Well, I also asked United directly and spokesperson Robin Urbanski told me that the airline will be moving to Terminal 1, but it’s unclear when that might be and that will happen on June 1. Clearly, this alliance is a little less organized, probably because the changes aren’t coming as quickly as with the others.

We know that the airlines in Terminal 1 will stay there for now. Terminal 2 will be demolished starting this year, so those guys have to move somewhere. On March 27, BA moves nearly all of its domestic and European flights out of Terminal 1, so I have to assume that everyone from Terminal 2 will move in before their terminal disappears. Will the Terminal 3 airlines move at the same time or will they stay longer? My guess is that they won’t move immediately because there’s no urgency. Here’s how they stack up right now along with my best guesses as to where they’ll go. The only thing I know for sure is that US Airways will go to Terminal 1 when it starts service to the airport on March 30.

Update 3/25 @ 822a - Star has put out a press release with much more guidance. All Star carriers will be expected to move to Heathrow East in 2012 when the terminal is completed, but I haven’t included those changes in here.

	Flights	Current terminal	New terminal	When?
Air Canada	All flights	3	3	No change
Air China	All flights	3	3	No change
Air New Zealand	All flights	3	1	June 10, 2008
ANA	All flights	3	3	No change
Asiana	All flights	1	1	No change
Austrian	All flights	2	1	November 2008
Blue 1	All flights	N/A	3	March 30, 2008
bmi	All flights	1	1	No change
Croatia	All flights	2	1	November 2008
LOT	All flights	1	1	No change
Lufthansa	All flights	2	1	November 2008
SAS	All flights	3	3	No change
Singapore	All flights	3	3	No change
South African	All flights	1	1	No change
Swiss	All flights	2	1	October 2008
TAP	All flights	2	1	November 2008
Thai	All flights	3	3	No change
Turkish	All flights	3	3	No change
United	All flights	3	1	July 4, 2008
US Airways	All flights	N/A	1	March 30, 2008

Of course, not all airlines are in alliances. Virgin Atlantic, for example, will stay in Terminal 3, so you won’t see any changes there. All other unaligned airlines (except for former oneworld member Aer Lingus which will be in Terminal 3) will end up in Terminal 4. Again, I’m not entirely sure when that might happen, but one thing is clear . . . there will be a lot of confusion at Heathrow until things settle down, and that could take years.

If you have to go to the airport in the near future, leave plenty of time and bring lots of patience. If you have the misfortune of connecting through Heathrow, especially while these changes are in progress, may God have mercy on your souls.

Click for more on Heathrow and more on BA. And click if you’d like to subscribe via RSS or daily email.

I had a completely different post lined up for today, but really, when news like this breaks, it’s hard to stay away. For those who haven’t yet heard, JetBlue will issue a bunch of new shares to Lufthansa giving them 19% of the company for about $300m. So far, there is no relationship between the two airlines in a commercial sense, but Lufthansa will hold a seat on JetBlue’s board, and after listening to their conference call this morning, it’s clear that they want more.

First thought? Enjoy your bitch-slap, United. Oh sure, that young little hussy JetBlue can’t replace you . . . yet, but Lufthansa is clearly not as faithful to you as you might have hoped. Maybe you shouldn’t have let yourself get so out of shape over the years.

Second thought? This is great for JetBlue. They get a bunch of cash, which is nice, and they get some solid external guidance from a very large, profitable European airline on their board. And yes, there are so many opportunities for cooperation here. Sweet.

Third thought? What exactly is Lufthansa thinking? This is why my brain hurts right now. They’ve already got a very strong presence in the US with both United and US Airways in the Star Alliance. Why not buy into them? Maybe they don’t like where things are going with those guys. But point-to-point JetBlue?

Even at the bare minimum, I think this makes sense. JetBlue’s shares, like those of most other airlines right now, are in the toilet. It’s a nice cheap investment that’s made even cheaper by the exchange rate. So, they have a good investment that also can give them a little presence in NYC with even the most basic of interline agreements, something that Star Alliance doesn’t have.

At most, it could be much bigger. I’m not really worried about US Airways in this equation, because they’ve never been a major Star Alliance player. But Lufthansa and United were founding Star members, lovers, and they share revenue on flights over the North Atlantic.

But let’s say that Lufthansa is sick and tired of United not paying attention to their business. Maybe they aren’t happy with management and they want something different. Hello, JetBlue.

United isn’t going to walk away from Lufthansa, because they have nowhere else to go (unless someone buys them). They need Lufthansa and Star more than the other way around. So, Lufthansa can keep United around while JetBlue has the chance to build up its domestic operation into a strong network. Does that take years? Most definitely. Can Lufthansa wait? Yeah, sure.

But what about international flying? Who cares? Right now, Lufthansa has to split Transatlantic revenues with United. So, they can kick them out and do the flying themselves with JetBlue waiting on the other end to fill up their planes. Remember, now with open skies, Lufthansa can fly from anywhere in Europe to anywhere in the US.

What about Pacific routes? Eh, ANA, Thai, Air China, Air India, Singapore . . . the list goes on and on. There are plenty of carriers on the other side that can take care of that market. So, JetBlue can become a major domestic powerhouse and then auf wiedersehen, United. They would lose US government traffic across the pond (since they have to fly US carriers), but I’m not sure how much business that is for them now.

Am I crazy? Probably. But remember, United has been talking about mergers for a long time. They may go run off with someone else and leave Star Alliance anyway. If Tilton can make enough money for him and his investors, don’t think he won’t do it.

Do I think this is going to happen? Nah, but it’s fun to think about it. We’ll probably see something happen that’s more in between these two extremes where Lufthansa gets to play with everyone. Pretty cool.

Today was a big day for new additions to global alliances. To be fair, these are just the announcements of additions but in the near future oneworld and SkyTeam fliers will have more options for mileage earning and redemption.

First up, SkyTeam. Air Europa, Copa Airlines, and Kenya Airways all signed up as associate members. Air Europa is based in Spain and flies to sun spots around the world so that frozen Europeans can warm up. Copa, formerly partially owned by SkyTeam member Continental, connects North and South America through its hub in Panama. Kenya Airways is probably the most exciting addition because it opens up an entire new continenta. From its Nairobi home in East Africa, the airline flies to Europe, Asia, West Africa, and Southern Africa.

Now, I’m not exaclty sure it was it means to be an associate member, but it probably means they have to get coffee and pick up dry cleaning for the primary members. I imagine the rules for joining as an associate are less strict so it’s easier to join. In the end though, they will have earn/burn ability for frequent flier miles, codesharing, and lounge sharing so the customer will benefit.

SkyTeam’s US members are Northwest, Continental, and Delta, at least until some merger happens and changes everything around.

Next up is oneworld. They said yesterday that as of April 1, Malev, Royal Jordanian, Japan Airlines (JAL), and all its affiliates will join the group. Also that day, Aer Lingus will leave the alliance and go it alone saying that everything is just fine, they’re at the controls, flying the plane, free to pursue a life of religious fulfillment.

Malev is based in Budapest (Hungary), Royal Jordanian in Amman (Jordan, duh), and JAL in Tokyo. They all fly to destinations on several continents. American is the US airline in this alliance.

Hong Kong’s Dragonair, along with LAN Ecuador and LAN Argentina will join sometime later this year as well marking a pretty strong expansion by the alliance.

Looks like the BA flight attendants have called off their strike after coming to agreement with management. This means there will be fewer disruptions this week, but there are still some problems.

BA says that if people changed their flights due to the strike, they can call back and have the original flights reinstated if they’d like. That being said, there are a couple caveats. Since this is so last minute, the airline says it won’t be able to offer full catering on all flights from Heathrow on Tuesday and Wednesday. If you are on a flight without full catering, they’ll give you a voucher in the airport to redeem for food.

There’s also no guarantee that every flight will be able to operate. Instead of giving the actual flights that will operate, they’ve annoyingly requested that everyone use the flight info link on their website on the day of the flight to see if it will operate. Lame.

I haven’t really talked about the impending strike over at British Airways because I was hoping it would be averted. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like that’s going to happen.

The strike will be by the TGWU union which repesents about 14,000 of BA’s flight attendants. What are they fighting over? Well, I like this commentary’s take on the situation. Though it appears to be over the matter of sick days and the elimination of one purser position on every 747 flight, it’s actually a much bigger fight over the future of the airline.

What does this mean for you? Well, if you’re traveling to the UK next week, watch out. It’s going to be an ugly one. BA announced that it’s pre-canceling flights, but you can check here for the most up to date info:

• Tuesday, Jan 30 - No flights will operate from Heathrow to the US/Canada and from Gatwick to Tampa, Bermuda, and Barbados. All flights to London will operate as scheduled from the US/Canada. No short haul European/UK flights will operate from Heathrow or Gatwick.
• Wednesday, Jan 31 - All flights between the US/Canada and London are canceled. No short haul European/UK flights will operate from Heathrow or Gatwick
• Thursday, Feb 1 - Most flights from the US/Canada to Heathrow and from Tampa, Bermuda, and Barbados to Gatwick are canceled but all flights from Heathrow will operate.
• Friday, Feb 2- Most flights will operate as normal with the possibility for a couple cancellations

The good news? It’s only a two day strike. The bad news? They’re planning more on Feb 5, 6, 7 and Feb 12, 13, 14.

I believe we can now officially declare Delta’s schedule planning announcements to be clear shots at US Airways and not merely coincidence.

On the heels of Delta’s New York/JFK - Phoenix and Salt Lake City - Charlotte announcements which I documented here, we get today’s announcement of new Salt Lake City - Pittsburgh flights. Yup, that’s the same Pittsburgh that US Airways considers a hublet these days.

The airline says it will begin one daily flight on a CRJ-900 regional jet on March 1. That’s right - almost 1,700 miles of good regional jet fun.

As I mentioned before, this appears to be just pure spite for US Airways. Bob Cortelyou, the head of Network Planning for Delta, was quoted in the release as saying “Delta continues to compete on every coast . . . .” This isn’t aimed at the local market - this is supposed to steal traffic between Pittsburgh and the West Coast from US Airways. It is also irresponsible asset utilization at its finest and yet another reason why US Airways could do a better job managing this airline.

And on that front, US Airways put a release out today saying that they hope to begin due diligence soon. I’m not sure why they put the release out. Maybe Delta is dragging its feet in the hopes that US Airways will just forget about it or something, and US Airways wants to point this out for all to see so that they can get things moving again.

One thing I do find very interesting is an article in USA Today which claims that US Airways will not fight for control of Delta if Delta management doesn’t want them to do so. Doug Parker made this statement at a meeting with USA Today reporters and editors yesterday. This seems very strange to me, because Delta management has been clear that they aren’t interested for months now. I’m not sure what would make Doug think that they’re going to change their minds, but maybe he knows more than we do.

Buying a plane ticket can be a frustrating experience. As a former airline pricer, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard people complain about how often fares change and how there seems to be no logic involved. Why do they pay more than another person for the same seat?

It makes perfect sense to me, of course. Airlines price their seats based on supply and demand, so if you book early when the plane is empty (high supply) and you travel on an uncrowded day (low demand), you’ll likely find the best price. I’m simplifying, of course, but you get the idea. People hate the lack of transparency and the fact that they don’t seem to get more for paying more.

It certainly doesn’t help that airlines use the same systems to sell tickets that they used 30 years ago. Those systems are very rigid in what they can and cannot do, so even though there are plenty of great ideas out there, very few can be implemented without major changes.

That’s where Air Canada has excelled.

Why Air Canada? Well, it probably helps that they have the lion’s share of the market up in Canada, so they can experiment without nearly as much consequence as someone down in the US. Still, they’ve done some very innovative things that have made them a model in terms of revenue generation.

First, start with their new tiered fare structure. They have five different fare groupings. The lowest, called Tango, is bare bones. You only earn 50% of the miles you fly, there are change fees for everything, and you have to pay $12 just to get an advance seat assignment. That is followed by Tango Plus, Latitude, Latitude Plus, and finally Executive Class (which is their premium cabin). For a full explanation of the difference in classes, go here.

It’s rare in the airline world, but with these fare groupings, you can now see what you’re getting by paying more. Of course, this only works if you have the right interface for customers, so Air Canada did a major makeover on their website. If you searched for a flight from Vancouver to Toronto, for example, here is what you would see.

The first thing you might notice is that it looks a lot like the Southwest website. It shows you every available flight and then which fare classes are open for sale on those flights. Even better than that, they have tabs at the top showing the lowest fares for five days on either side of your chosen date, just in case you’re flexible. It makes it very easy to get a good picture of the fare landscape.

One thing I like as a former revenue guy is that they change fares within each fare group. You may have to squint, but look at the first flight as compared to the second flight. In Tango, you’ll pay $168 for the first one, but $194 for the second. Even within each category, they’re looking to match supply with demand. It may still hearken back to the black box idea of revenue management from the customer perspective, but it’s a good middle-ground that offers good transparency for the customer as well as the ability to revenue manage for the airline.

Now, in their latest move, Air Canada has taken things one step further to actually creating a world of a la carte pricing. So now, let’s say you want the Tango fare. When you select it, you’ll go to this screen.

This was just launched last week, and I think it’s great. The idea is to get to the point where every person can pay a different fare and actually feel good about doing so.

You don’t care about earning miles? Well, save $3. Air Canada will give you the discount so they don’t get the liability of those miles on their books.

You don’t need to check bags? Great, save $4 for not using the resources to get your bag in the belly of the plane.

Do you know you won’t change your flight? Excellent, save $6 on that one as well.

The best part about this is the presentation. US carriers will often tack on fees for various things. Air Canada could easily have said that there is a $4 fee for checking bags, but instead, they give you a $4 discount for not checking bags. It’s the same thing (assuming they can bump the base fare up $4 - something they can probably do in Canada), but the customer ends up feeling good about it.

So is this the future of ticket sales? I really hope so. It makes a lot of sense to tailor tickets to each person’s needs if you can. Let each person choose what they want and the buying process becomes much more pleasant as well as transparent.

Will the US carriers try this? Probably not in the near future, at least not the big guys. First, it requires a big change on the tech side. More importantly though, if competitors don’t go along with it, there is a lot of risk involved. If there was one big airline I’d expect to give something like this a shot, it’s US Airways since they have been known to take risks, but most of the others are probably too conservative to do it right.

In the meantime, Air Canada will continue to innovate. They’ve announced that they’ve signed on with ITA Software to replace their reservation system internally. That new generation software can only open up additional opportunity to improve the purchase process for everyone.

The 757 is an aircraft that missed its calling. It was supposed to be a replacement for the 727 back in the 1980s. This meant its mission was for mid to longer-range domestic flights. The longest hauls were still the domain of the widebodies.