This Week’s Featured Link
Connect Airlines Receives US Department of Transportation Interstate Scheduled Airline Certificate – Connect Airlines
Another newbie is now ready to enter the ring. The biggest hurdle has been passed.
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Two for the Road
Travel Chaos Pits Pandemic Winner Qantas Against Angry Aussies – Bloomberg
Well, it’s not just US airlines that travelers hate. Though this seems next level. This video cracked me up.
What is the San Bernardino airport doing to prepare for commercial flights? – The Sun
It’s not often a new airport has to prepare for its first commercial flights. That is happening right now in San Bernardino with Breeze service only a month away.
11 comments on “3 Links I Love: A Brand New Airline, Angry Aussies, SBD Prepares”
You guys have got to watch that video it’s hysterical.
Everyone traveling bitches and moans about how the airlines took money and then now can’t service our customers. This is just the reality of when you suddenly lose 90% of your business then it all comes back, it’s really hard to make that work without logistical issues.
Australians really know how to do satire and parody. The Qantas video is absolutely hilarious.
When Australia finally opened up to tourism 4 or 5 months ago, I was really hopeful that the widebody belly space on the pax flights would drive down air freight rates and improve service, but no luck. Air freight from the US to AU remains extremely challenging, expensive, and unreliable, with long and unpredictable transit times.
In reference to Breeze, I saw their A-220-300 in Tulsa yesterday. It’s a beautiful plane, with monster motors for its size. I’ve seen the Delta A-220-100 as well (and it looks good too), but the larger model Breeze is flying just looks really good.
CF, I know you’re a Socal airport guru. Why SBD instead of ONT?
Being 20 plus miles further inland increases its convenience to Palm Springs but reduces its catchment area. It’s bordered by the 10, 210 and 215 but isn’t directly connected to any of them. Given the nature of the Breeze service and pricing, I doubt there is any competitive advantage using SBD in lieu of ONT as most of their pxs will likely be driving by ONT to get there.
It leads me to believe incentives from the airport were the main driver. If that’s the case, is it a “throwing good money after bad” situation, given a lot of money was spent to build an empty passenger terminal so why not throw some more money in to get some actual flights?
Finally, ONT seems like it’s been very aggressive about growing its service. Is this a dropped ball on their part to lose the Breeze station to SBD?
Bill – Good questions on Breeze in SBD. My guess is that Breeze just wanted a different airport where it had no competition. After all, United already flies 4x daily from ONT to SFO. Southwest used to fly it but pulled out. Breeze is only flying very infrequently, and it probably figured that ONT just didn’t have the opportunity that a clean slate would provide. My hopes are very low for success there. SBD is located in a terrible place where ONT or PSP are usually more convenient to most of the key population centers. It’s just a single flight, so maybe they will find something that works. But there is one other potential angle…
David Neeleman is Mormon, and if he had a hand in deciding where to fly, SBD may start to make more sense. There are currently only 7 Mormon Temples in California, and one of them is in Redlands, a mere 15 minutes away from SBD. The SFO flight is now going to continue beyond SFO to Provo. So maybe he’s trying to tap into the church to make it work.
CF,
I believe the Southwest ONT-SFO service began in Summer 2019 and barely lasted a year, ending more or less with the pandemic. Actually, Frontier was very recently flying the route roughly once a day. In any case, Southwest now has a far smaller network at SFO than it did prior to 2020.
Yes, you are correct about Redlands and its sizeable Mormon community. There are three Mormon temples in Redlands alone.
Type “Mormon Church” in Google Maps, and you will find multiple Mormon temples in the area–Yucaipa, Highland, San Bernardino, Rialto, Fontana, Riverside, Moreno Valley . . . we get it.
Maybe the SBD flight should skip SFO and go straight to Provo.
Are those Churches or Temples? They’re not the same.
David M – There is one Temple in Redlands which is one of the 7 in California. The rest are just churches.
My apologies for not knowing the difference between Mormon temples and churches.
That’s what I figured but didn’t have the chance to dig into this morning. I know the temples are a pretty big deal (I was able to tour the La Jolla one before it was consecrated) so the idea of three in Redlands alone seemed a bit much.
Oh yeah, is Connect just Porter 2.0?