AA one of six airlines granted routes to Cuba

[FWAAA]

Don't let the fact AA just signed a new lease with CLT, is the second largest hub and one of the most profitable hub.

The LUS long-term lease at CLT was at the end of its term, and as you know, real estate leases are different from RLA contracts, so AA had no choice but to negotiate and sign a new lease. IIRC, the new lease is for a shorter term than the previous US lease.

Further, the CLT rent is cheap - really cheap, and if downsizing the CLT hub (not closing it, but trimming 200-300 daily flights) makes financial sense, then the new facilities lease isn't an impediment.

"One of the most profitable" hubs? Not very easy to test that, since management doesn't release any data on hub profitability. What we do know is that it has very little O&D but what it has pays fairly high fares. AA management did announce in 2014 that CLT had "the lowest unit revenue of any east coast hub."
 

Tracy Montross, director of government and community relations for American Airlines in Charlotte, told council members that Charlotte Douglas should expect to see more tweaking of its flight schedule. The airline has added four seasonal routes to Europe – but then cut them back due to weak demand – and added more Midwest routes.

Charlotte Douglas is unique: A huge hub with a small passenger base.

“Charlotte’s population compared to other hubs is very low,” Montross said.

As a result, 80 percent of the airport’s passengers are connecting, not starting or stopping their trips in the city. The city also has the smallest “unit revenue,” or the revenue the airline gets from each passenger, of any East Coast hub.

http://www.charlotteobserver.com/news/business/article9127097.html#storylink=cpy

How might AA increase the unit revenue at CLT? Cut a couple hundred flights a day that are almost entirely filled with connecting passengers who could fly nonstop or connect at DFW or ORD or MIA or PHL instead of connecting at CLT.

Another thing we know is that the pilots and FAs at CLT were the lowest paid among the legacy pilots and FAs, but the merger brought them up to AA's payrates. Lowest unit revenue of any east coast hub (according to AA management) and now much higher payrates for pilots and FAs. That's not an encouraging set of statistics.

The CLT hub won't be closed. It won't be PIT'd or CVG'd or MEM'd or RDU'd or BNA'd. But its heady growth days are behind it, and once the promises to the state attorneys general expire early next year, we may see some pruning of the CLT hub. It will still be a big hub, but not 650-daily flights big. It could easily accomplish its role as a SE connecting hub with 350 daily flights.

CLT has seen some good news on the unit revenue front late last year and early this year, as CLT's unit revenue didn't fall by the same large percentages as AA did systemwide. CLT has less ULLC competition (for now) but when the 9 new gates are finished in the A concourse, WN gets at least two and other airlines have lined up for the rest.

Again, CLT won't be closed. But it ain't growing. Some midwest cities are using federal grants and local grants to subsidize some new CRJ routes to CLT, but that ain't "growth." There are fewer seasonal widebody international flights this summmer at CLT than in past summers, as I (and many others) correctly predicted.