Passengers Driving From Us Airways

BoeingBoy

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Nov 9, 2003
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PITTSBURGH (AP) -- Pittsburgh International Airport could lose 15 percent of its passengers over the next five years, many of them to a smaller nearby airport in Ohio, an aviation consulting firm said.

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Jim
 
I love this part:
Kent George, executive director of the Allegheny County Airport Authority, which runs the Pittsburgh airport, estimates that 750,000 people a year decide against flying from Pittsburgh for a number of reasons, including high fares.
What other reasons? Because they like the drive to CAK? Because the number of nonstop destinations from CAK dwarfs that of PIT? :rolleyes:

It's the fares, Kent! Bring WN (or even, perish the thought, rational US fares) to PIT and watch the O&D rise.
 
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mweiss,

I think I've seen a number for the estimated number of people driving to CLE a year currently and IIRC that is most of the 3/4 million. CAK will be just an additional drain - but maybe we can put some RJ's in there!!!

And I agree - it's mainly the fares. Makes you wonder what would happen if they dropped PIT fares so the yield was the same as PHL. Would more traffic offset the lower yield???

Jim
 
I think there's a misperception that rationalizing fare structures necessarily results in lower yields. I suggest this because business travelers have been leaking across the old market segmentation barriers by changing their behaviors. The price differentials between leisure and business fares have become high enough to cause this leakage.

As a result, the conventional wisdom that the highest margins can be extracted from the traditional segmentation methods may no longer hold true.
 
Many of our own passengers drive to CAK simply to fly back to PIT because it cheaper than flying out of PIT. I know this sounds silly, and why it would be cheaper to add a leg is beyond me. But I got this from the passengers themselves. Speaking of CAK, Air Tran is starting service to Boston this June. That's 5, count 'em, 5 destinations Air Tran servs out of CAK. We only do 2, PIT and CLT, and the CLT is one round trip a day. Why not do PHL or DCA?
 
dragonbravo said:
why it would be cheaper to add a leg is beyond me
It illustrates the difference between cost-based pricing and demand-based pricing.
 
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I have no idea of what the "book" terminology is, but it existed long before the LCC influx - it's all about competitive fares. Used to see it all the time in GSO vs CLT fares to the same destinition - say FLL.

GSO-CLT-FLL would be roughly $100 less than CLT-FLL even though the passenger ended up on the same plane for the CLT-FLL leg. Why? No nonstop competition on the CLT-FLL flight so fares were higher than DAL's ATL connection. However, from GSO there was direct competition from DAL with a similiar connnecting flight.

It's the whole reason the folks in the hub cities complain of high fares. All those nonstops carry a premium price. Now, I'm not justifing the amount of premium, just saying that a nonstop could justify some premium.

Of course, the LCC's are changing that pretty rapidly when they enter a hub market. They are basically using a very loose version of milage-based pricing - the longer the distance, the higher the fare. Interestingly enough, something AMR tried to start in the early to mid 80's (IIRC) and none of the other network carriers would adopt.

Jim
 
Point to Point flying it is the only way.

Ever notice that Piedmont had a great system they had hub and spoke and point to point wow what consept.........

Not having the flight crews sit 3 hours a day.......but hey why change when we can get the employees to take pay cuts.................
 
Point to Point flying it is the only way.

Ever notice that Piedmont had a great system they had hub and spoke and point to point wow what concept..............

Not having the flight crews sit 3 hours a day.......but hey why change when we can get the employees to take pay cuts.................
 
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