Havanna Overnights?

[PullUp]

President Obama just announced normalization of diplomatic relations with Cuba.
Travel restrictions will be lifted. Let's go to the beach, baby!
Cheers.

 

[eolesen]

Only problem is that the embargo remains, and requires Congressional action to repeal it.

Travel restrictions will be eased, but not lifted entirely. From the NYT:

The United States will also ease travel restrictions across all 12 categories currently envisioned under limited circumstances in American law, including family visits, official visits and journalistic, professional, educational and religious activities, public performances, officials said. Ordinary tourism, however, will remain prohibited.

 

[WorldTraveler]

and it isn't clear that EVEN IF Congress allows Obama's that scheduled flights will be allowed or economical and to what degree - and who will gain the rights to operate them.

 

[commavia]

One thing is for sure - one way or another, demand to Cuba is clearly going to rise in the coming months and years.  And AA is, for obvious reasons, in the best position to take advantage of this growth.
 
This should be quite helpful to AA's bottom line, and make of for all of the allegedly disastrous currency challenges in Venezuela, and equally disastrous "investments" in Asia, and AA's utter failure in NYC, and the catastrophe that has been AA's successful petition to the DOT to reopen SEA-HND, etc.

 

[EastCheats]

Only problem is that the embargo remains, and requires Congressional action to repeal it.Travel restrictions will be eased, but not lifted entirely. From the NYT:

It's far from a done deal.

Graham: Block funds for US embassy in Cuba

By Rebecca Shabad - 12/17/14 12:49 PM EST
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) on Wednesday said he will seek to block federal funds from financing a future U.S. embassy in Cuba.

Graham said President Obama's decision to hold talks on normalizing relations with Cuba was a bad idea in a message posted on Twitter.

 

[Overspeed]

Republicans are probably actually happy secretly. Obama takes the hit and they get to scream about how bad this is for their voters. Their super PAC backers are probably ecstatic because they now have another place to outsource American jobs.
 
On a side note, when can we buy Cuban cigars direct? Also, doesn't MIA get a lot of field trips on those flights?

 

[ChockJockey]

I think the normalization of relations between the U.S. and Cuba is well overdue. The practices of embargo and exclusion have so clearly failed that it seems to me anyone insisting they remain in place do so because it is in their interest to see the Brothers Castro remain in power. For a while now the whole Cuba issue hasn't been about Cuba but about appeasing voting blocs in an influential swing state.

Any free-marketeer can tell you one of the most potent cures for Communism is to let market dynamics and private enterprise gain a foothold. There is an opportunity here to materially improve the livelihoods of millions of Cubans while creating new markets for U.S. goods, services, and expertise. Whether regime change happens in Cuba via revolution or reform is anyone's guess but this can only be hastened by normalization and the embargo as a piece of unfinished business from the Cold War should finally be put to rest.

 

[eolesen]

One thing is for sure - one way or another, demand to Cuba is clearly going to rise in the coming months and years.  And AA is, for obvious reasons, in the best position to take advantage of this growth.

Please... don't assume that AA will get the windfall. Surely you know there's far more demand within the Cuban ex-pat community to fly via ATL.

Or maybe this is what DL was waiting for before announcing its long anticipated MIA hub?

 

[robbedagain]

What i dont understand is China is communist and the US and US Air Carriers fly there yet Cuba is different...

 

[WorldTraveler]

Please... don't assume that AA will get the windfall. Surely you know there's far more demand within the Cuban ex-pat community to fly via ATL.

Or maybe this is what DL was waiting for before announcing its long anticipated MIA hub?

or maybe a high speed ferry will make more economic sense than flights from MIA.

 

[cynic]

What i dont understand is China is communist and the US and US Air Carriers fly there yet Cuba is different...

A lot of American companies lost assets when the government nationalized everything in the revolution. That will have to be sorted out over the next couple years before relations can be fully normalized.

 

[silverbird007]

AA has flights to Havana now and has for years. I see the flights leaving MIA all the time. They are "charters" but I'm sure they can easily convert to regular scheduled flights when it becomes legal. I remember United had flights from MIA to Havana also back when they had a hub in Miami. Not sure about now but at one time Eagle was flying to several smaller cities in Cuba

 

[Mach85ER]

or maybe a high speed ferry will make more economic sense than flights from MIA.

 
 
Rent a boat any day of the year from Marathon or West Palm and make an attempt to get halfway out the straights between FL and the Bahamas/Cuba.
 
There is a reason many homemade rafts are found empty off West Palm and JAX year round and people with legit boats disappear.
 
I've seen plenty of flights where one could water ski on a sunny day from Portugal to just near the point where Torpedo 8 disappeared 100 miles NE of PBI where it turns to 8' plus seas with white caps. There is nothing "high speed" about going through that crap on any boat without a helmet and a 5 point harness.
 
Run along skippy, adults are talking.

 

[mstrmoe]

A lot of American companies lost assets when the government nationalized everything in the revolution. That will have to be sorted out over the next couple years before relations can be fully normalized.

Yep, China didn't take away all of the American banana corporations' assets when they had their civil war. 

 

[AA-MRO.COM]

The fat cats and bankers will buy up the shorelines and set up shop. Then you can pay them to stay there.