More Isp Svc Lost

Add me to the list. I fly ORF-BWI through PHL REGULARLY to avoid the greyhound bus in the sky nonstop ORF-BWI.
 
Isn't ORF-BWI the shortest flight WN has?

Its a scheduled 50 minute flight.. so that means about 30 minutes in the air.. doesn't make sense to me, but to each their own. looks like the quickest US can get you there is in 3.5 hours.. and I thought time was money.. ???
 
Don't forget that ORF is one of the top 10 obesity cities in the world so I have to show up an extra hour in order to not have someone's ass in my lap. I said 'regularly' but it's been a few months now actually, normally it's 2.5 hours + 1 hour at the airport = 3.5 hours US and 3 hours on NW
 
Heinrich said:
Don't forget that ORF is one of the top 10 obesity cities in the world so I have to show up an extra hour in order to not have someone's ass in my lap. I said 'regularly' but it's been a few months now actually, normally it's 2.5 hours + 1 hour at the airport = 3.5 hours US and 3 hours on NW
Are you and PineyBob aware you can simply check-in on line before you leave for the airport and get that coveted "A" boarding pass?

And how does an assigned seat ensure that a big butt won't get assigned the seat next to you?
 
According to the latest US DoT information 99.80% of travelers going between ISP and BWI take SW airlines. Since 599.45 passengers travel between those two airports daily that equates to 1.2 passengers per day that fly between those two airports and don't use SW airlines.

Those who write in and say that they will never fly SW they are at the extreme fringe as almost all other passengers are make their choices because of convenience and price.

It is incredible to me why the other majors don't make a serious commitment to ISP. It is the closest airport to an affluent group of over 3 million customers (Nassau and Suffolk counties)
 
An assigned seat doesn't but first class does.

Also when I did fly southwest:

#1 - when I checked in online I wasn't checked in when I got to the airport.

#2 - I had a flight cancel on me and I had to wait around not knowing when I was going to get up there because I had to go on standby until 3 flights later, which was in the afternoon.

RIDICULOUS
 
Bear,

I am aware you can check in online, but remember that most of us don't have printers with us in hotel rooms. Therefore online checkin is only of use in most cases on the outbound flights.

I am in agreement with Heinrich--the problem of having no options when irregular ops occur is not a risk I am willing to take. I have seen "Airline" once too often.

Also regarding driving, it is relaxing, I have my own car at destination, don't need to bother with the hassle of airports, and I can get lots of work done as I can be on the phone most of the time.

Sorry it's still a no go for the greyhound of the skies.
 
According to the latest US DoT information 99.80% of travelers going between ISP and BWI take SW airlines. Since 599.45 passengers travel between those two airports daily that equates to 1.2 passengers per day that fly between those two airports and don't use SW airlines.

Those who write in and say that they will never fly SW they are at the extreme fringe as almost all other passengers are make their choices because of convenience and price.

It is incredible to me why the other majors don't make a serious commitment to ISP. It is the closest airport to an affluent group of over 3 million customers (Nassau and Suffolk counties)


If you want to know why majors dont take ISP serious. I think they just dont want to make money here.

ISP AIRPORT is the most glaring example of how two airlines can take complete different approaches at a station.

US- (1997) bails out of Long Island because they are unable to fill seats on their 7 daily jet flights in an area of the country with the one of the highest household incomes.

SWA- (2004) Up to 25 daily flights and is about to complete a $ 70 Million Terminal. Will most likely be at 80 flights a day soon after the second half of the terminal is complete.

Again, US has Egg on its face saying no one can make money at ISP. Do you think SWA would put up 70 Million dollars if they were not making big yields?
 
AirplaneFan said:
Those who write in and say that they will never fly SW they are at the extreme fringe as almost all other passengers are make their choices because of convenience and price.
Not necessarily. I'm sure many drive to LGA to fly to WAS because it actually takes less time than flying ISP-PHL-WAS.
 
Art
Since the vast majority of the consumers are not willing to pay one penny more for the type of service UAIR offers relative to LUV and B6 how do they make it work for you at ISP. Offer better service-read higher cost that no one is willing to pay for. You may like the pariking price and short drive to ISP but the average consumer is not willing to pay for that, witness the consumer in Allentown who drives to BWI. Sorry but UAIR has to deploy its assets where they make the most or at least lose the least.
 
TOGALOCK,

Your assumption that the flying public would not pay a penny more is right--for the itinerant leisure traveler and some business travelers. Most of my colleagues and very frequent fliers I speak to (virtually ALL the ISP regulars and LGA regulars I speak to), WOULD pay a REASONABLE premium to stay with a major carrier (not just US) and avoid Southwest. I don't mean 5 - 10 times the fare, I mean maybe $20-$30 more, but not $718 ISP-PHL as it is currently.

I am not going to debate my reasons for not flying WN any more. I have made my choice and it stands. I fly way too much to do the cattle class thing with or without web checkin. I respect your right to like WN, please respect mine not to--it only takes one episode of Airline to scare an experienced traveler off.

If US continues on this road to a withdrawal from ISP, there are other choices--namely DL AA and CO. And as much as I hate it, I do have LGA and JFK as a back up.

My best to you all.....
 
Also when I did fly southwest:

#1 - when I checked in online I wasn't checked in when I got to the airport.

I would never accuse anyone of making up a story on here but I would sort of question as to whether someone might have been, in the words of Tom in "To Kill A Mockingbird".....mistaken in their mind.

How do you check in for a flight on line and then end up not checked in?

Every time...and I do this a bunch (as proof I can show you the stacks of drink coupon books and RR tickets on the mantle)...every time I check in for a flight on WN online I print a boarding pass, the boarding pass gets me thru security, and then it gets me on the plane.

On WN if you check in, you print out a boarding pass on your printer. If you don't have a boarding pass, you probably aren't checked in. If you have one, I cannot imagine anyone at the airport claiming you aren't checked in. I would like to know what the rationale for the airline saying someone wasn't checked in if they had a home-computer generated boarding pass in hand....and I bet Herb, Colleen, and Jim Parker would be interested in hearing about it too.

I won't even attempt to try to persuade Art...he has his own reasons. I think he's wrong, but we are all entitled to our opinions. I wouldn't be surprised, though, if sooner or later...he had to get someplace fast.....and the ugly, allegedly cattle car 737s were the ONLY thing that could get him there in time....so he sucks it up and bites the bullet and buys a ticket and discovers that there are a lot of business types on the plane, it's not anything at all like the TV show Airline, and people don't die from flying WN.
 
Actually, it appears to me that the reason US (as well as DL, CO, NW, etc.) is reducing fares at ISP is the fact that ISP is one of the lowest-yielding markets out there for airline service. It's got lower average fares than TPA, MCO, LAS, FLL, etc. As the dominant player (by far) at ISP, WN has set the fare levels and is keeping them relatively low given that they face a lot of low-fare competition down the road (for Long Island passengers) at JFK. But WN continues to expand there, which says that they must find the market to be profitable.

I understand that Art and others have their own personal reasons for not wishing to fly WN (such as the lack of assigned seating and/or first class), but I simply cannot understand some of the inconveniences they go through as a result. I remember Art once related the fact that he connected on American Eagle via BOS to go from ISP to BNA; while I can understand the desire for an assigned seat, those ERJ's don't offer first class, and that had to add nearly three hours to the trip time. Not to mention the fact that BOS is about the absolute last place I'd try to make a connection. Or how folks have been willing to put up with all the problems that US Express has in PHL in order to make a connection on an older, noisy turboprop. I suppose it's just an issue of how the value of your time and/or willingness to put up with inconveniences balance out.

The problem with ISP for US is that probably 90-99% of passengers are connecting at PHL. And offering that connecting service on a high-CASM turboprop (along with another express or mainline flight out of PHL) gets to be very uncompetitive with WN's cost structure. The problem with a hypothetical ISP-CLT is that a large percentage of the passengers (absent good revenue management) would be traveling to Florida, largely at fares set by WN. You might pick up some traffic to smaller Southeastern cities, but without two or three daily RJ's, you won't be competitive with Delta for business traffic. And WN's got as good or better coverage of everything west of the Mississippi through connections at BWI, MDW, BNA, or LAS. It is just very difficult to make acceptable yields from ISP given US's route and cost structure at this point.
 
It'd be interesting to consider how US would do flying 737s to, say, BOS from ISP. While I doubt there'd be many takers at $1,200 RT, I'm certain that a premium of, say, 10-20% could be charged relative to WN's flights to New England. I'd expect similar sorts of comparable flights to be run elsewhere.

Of course, I don't know enough of the breakdown of US's costs to determine if the costs would exceed the revenues even on this sort of travel.