Usa Opportunity?

[a320av8r]

"...United also said that, effective May 1, it would eliminate two non-hub international flights: daily Boeing 767 service from Miami to Buenos Aires, and daily Boeing 767 service from Miami to Sao Paulo. United will continue to serve Buenos Aires and Sao Paulo from its hubs at Washington/Dulles and Chicago.

United will continue to serve Miami from its domestic hubs. However, because United will no longer fly to South America from Miami, the company said it intends to close its Miami domicile for flight attendants. In addition, the Company will begin contractually mandated discussions with ALPA to determine the future of the pilot domicile. The 99 pilots and 481 flight attendants currently domiciled in Miami will have the opportunity to bid for other assignments within the United system; there will be no additional pilot or flight attendant furloughs as a result of this Miami schedule reduction. Approximately 150 Miami-based personnel will be furloughed effective May 1 -- this includes ground service, kitchen, human resources and training personnel..."

 

[700UW]

UAL does not have a HUB in MIA, read the article.

CHICAGO (Reuters) - United Airlines said on Friday it would begin three new routes from its Chicago and Washington hubs to Osaka, Buenos Aires and Zurich but stop some service from Miami to Latin America in a bid to strengthen its network and beef up hub service.

 

[ITRADE]

US's southern sphere would be out of CLT, not MIA. US could develop a hub at TPA if it really wanted, but its probably not in a position to do so.

In any event, AA owns MIA and is working to streamline MIA.

 

[a320av8r]

We sure wouldn't want to think outside of the box would we?

 

[etops1]

stranger things have happened. mia would prove great for a carribbean gateway for us. screw amr. ual is our partner . you never know what bronner has up his sleeve. remember he owns leases on some of ual's jets.

 

[ITRADE]

We sure wouldn't want to think outside of the box would we?

Well, I just don't think that battling AA is in US's best interest.

If US were going to create a gateway in Florida, I'd rather do it at TPA. The metro area is pretty big. No one carrier is dominant there. There are a lot of gates open at Airside F. And, if US were to choose a single fleet type (mainline) to operate out of there, they could easily get a lease on a hanger for maintenance.

 

[sfb]

United presumably has a somewhat loyal customer base in MIA and a handful of Deep South America cities, and yet they don't feel these flights are workable for them. Why would US have more success going up against American from their MIA fortress than United did? Where exactly would US get the aircraft to fly these routes, especially given the existing widebody fleet can barely cover the summer transatlantic service? Not to mention that they'd need traffic rights to Brazil and Argentina (which I doubt that UAL is interested in giving up).

There's a big difference between adding a bunch of weekend flights from your strongest hubs to vacation destinations in the Caribbean and going up against the largest U.S. carrier to South America from a hub it dominates. This is not a good battle to pick, especially since their costs are comparable or lower (and they have better connecting feed).

 

[a320av8r]

US Airways is still the largest carrier on the east coast. UAL does not have the feed to South America from the east coast that AA does. Even AA doesn't have the east coast feed that U does.
US*, combined with the Star Alliance, could provide that feed.
Aircraft can be had with no problem, just go to MHV and pick some out.
Training would be no problem since most of the U pilots have been captains and most are typed on the wide bodies (757/767) as well as the 737 and A320 series.
US* could provide the SA/LA/Carribean service for the Star Alliance.
UA* has the facilities in MIA (LH*, AC*,etc*).
It's time to think outside the envelope.

 

[sfb]

Look:

United hasn't abandoned South America. They will continue to fly to EZE and GRU from IAD and ORD. United had almost no feed at MIA, so those flights relied on primarily O&D traffic, passengers from other UA hub cities with non-stops to MIA, or people willing to double-connect to save some money. US has flights to MIA from PIT, PHL, and CLT, plus a few US Express flights to EYW, TPA, etc. Why would passengers double-connect on US (at MIA and one of the other hubs) when they can get to South America with a single connection at EWR, ORD, IAD, ATL, IAH, DFW, or MIA?

Delta has GREAT feed at ATL and they could not make ATL-EZE work (largely due to the disastrous state of the Argentine economy). They also discontinued ATL-GIG.

It's immaterial in any case because United didn't give up the authorities to South America, they're just moving the flights. Actually, I think there may be unused authorities to EZE and GIG, but GRU is the prize down there.

And besides, Star Alliance already has coverage in South America courtesy of Varig (if they stay in business). And Europeans wishing to travel to South America would likely fly non-stop to GIG or GRU from FRA.

This isn't about "thinking outside the box/envelope" -- this is about picking battles where you can succeed. AA has feed to MIA from most of the cities which produce significant traffic to Latin America.

 

[a320av8r]

:down:

 

[Cosmo]

Two other points need to be kept in mind. (1) The U.S.-Brazil bilateral agreement is not an open skies agreement, and it currently allows only four U.S. carriers to operate nonstop service to Brazil. Those four are AA (from DFW, MIA and JFK), CO (from EWR and IAH), DL (from ATL) and UA (from IAD and ORD). The fact that UA is dropping its MIA flights in a few months doesn't change that restriction. (2) With few exceptions, the flights from the U.S. to Brazil and Argentina are overnight in both directions, thus requiring two aircraft to operate one daily round trip. Does US have four spare B767/A330 aircraft to replace UA's flights from MIA?

I'm not sure if there are similar bilateral restrictions regarding U.S. carrier service to Argentina, but Brazil is a substantially bigger market from the U.S. and its economy is performing better than Argentina's. So without the ability to serve Brazil at this time, it seems to me that now is not the right time (and given AA's strength there, MIA's not the right place) for US to begin deep South America service.

 

[ringmaruf]

There are bilateral restrictions to Argentina, but I believe CO has rights that they're not using that US could use. That being said, it makes no sense to go to EZE before GRU.