Delta Shrinks Cincinnati Again

Oct 8, 2009

More Reading on This Topic: CVG – Cincinnati, Delta

The “death by a thousand cuts” strategy seems to be continuing in Cincinnati. Delta is shrinking once again in November and December. Is this sounding like American in St Louis to anyone else?

Here’s the deal. The following cities will be losing roughly a flight day from Cincinnati:
Greensboro – November 30
Hartford – December 16
Huntsville – December 16
Indianapolis – December 16
Milwaukee – December 15
Northwest Arkansas – December 16
St Louis – December 16
Tri-Cities (Tennessee) – December 16
Tulsa (loses its only flight) – January 4

If there’s any consolation, Cincinnati will be getting another flight to Minneapolis. Hmm, that’s not much in the way of consolation is it?

It’s possible these are just cuts for the winter season and they’ll come back next summer. Um, yeah. That’s it. The airport appears to be on an inevitable march toward hublessness despite a lack of any official proclamation.

Brett

14 responses to “Delta Shrinks Cincinnati Again”

Dan Webb

Oct 8, 2009 at 7:36 am

Ah, I remember the good ol’ days a few years back when Delta operated its few remaining 737-200s between PVD and CVG. Now we’re down to one daily ERJ.

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A

Oct 8, 2009 at 7:51 am

I don’t find it unusual that the disappearing hubs are happening in cities that have seen better days come and go. Cincinnati and St. Louis both look like towns that couldn’t muster much O/D traffic. Shrinking populations, boarded up buildings, etc. Meanwhile the big hubs are in growth cities like Atlanta and Dallas, etc. Detroit seems like the anomaly, but I suppose the car buiz is still kicking enough to keep their traffic #’s up.

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Bryan B

Oct 8, 2009 at 9:29 am

I was never a big fan of the Delta operation at CVG. I usually connected there flying in on Comair CRJ’s. I hated taking the shuttle bus from Concourse C to the other Delta concourses. When the Delta/Northwest merger was announced you could see that the future didn’t look bright for CVG. I figured the same thing would happen in MEM, but so far they seem to be doing better than Cincy.

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DELTADON

Oct 8, 2009 at 9:34 am

MAYBE THEY ARE GOING TO MOVE THIS EQUIPMENT TO A BOSTON FORT LAUDERDALE NON STOP SERVICE SINCE AT THIS TIME NON EXISTS.

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Zack Rules, Albany, NY

Oct 8, 2009 at 9:56 am

I think Delta recently dropped it’s Boston-Fort Lauderdale nonstop flights. Jetblue and Spirit hammered their yields.

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Nicholas Barnard

Oct 8, 2009 at 11:31 am

While I still have ties to Cincinnati I root for this hub to get smaller and smaller. (and I lived in the town the airport actually gets its code from, Covington, Kentucky. Yeah Cincinnati airport is in Kentucky.)

I remember back in my flight school days that the CVG controllers had a really big head especially when they got declared Class B airspace. I wonder if they’ll go back to Class C….

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David SFeastbay

Oct 8, 2009 at 2:30 pm

DTW and CVG are to close to each other. What would be the advantage of keeping both anyway. With costs the way they are and all the airlines doing what they can to save money, there is not much of a benefit to keeping service up at both.

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ShaneLAX

Oct 8, 2009 at 3:11 pm

Went through there last week on a LAX-CVG-PVD itinerary. It was sad to see such a large airy facility being underutilized. Now it’s getting sadder. Even most of the concession businesses didn’t open until 8am.

I would hope that another carrier might take advantage of the situation. It wouldn’t surprise me if the local governments started offering incentives to airlines.

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Allen

Oct 8, 2009 at 4:59 pm

@ David SFeastbay:

Not only is Detroit close but Atlanta and Memphis aren’t that much farther, either. And really, what use does Delta have for all these hubs? Surely if they were willing to drop a hub at a metro as big as Dallas, we shouldn’t be surprised to see them ditch Cincinatti.

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PF

Oct 8, 2009 at 8:39 pm

Do you know how DL is doing in SLC?

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John

Oct 9, 2009 at 5:10 am

and just this week they file schedule with HSV out in the spring

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CF

Oct 9, 2009 at 8:50 am

PF wrote:

Do you know how DL is doing in SLC?

I haven’t looked at the govt data lately, but it’s really their only option in the west right now. I can’t imagine that will go anywhere.

John wrote:

and just this week they file schedule with HSV out in the spring

Oh boy. Death by a thousand cuts . . .

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Steve

Oct 9, 2009 at 12:56 pm

CVG may be Southwest’s next new city? Dallas Morning News quoted Southwest as saying they would be opening new cities in 2010 similar to LGA, BOS, MKE and MSP in 2009.

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dan powers

Oct 9, 2009 at 3:05 pm

next flight to get axed = cvg-cdg…if lucky cvg will be a focus city. now that atl signed a deal with dl…i forsee mem getting downsized.

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