Well the Easter/start of spring break holiday season will be released on July 27. The week of Easter it's rumored WN
Will be back up to pre 737-300 retirement fleet count.
And should be up 5+ new 7378MAX aircraft coming in on line the week before Easter.

There's lots of talk that FLL will see some domestic growth in this schedule release.
With a few new cities getting nonstop service.

I believe the Round 2 of MEX slots open up as well so 2 of those new aircraft can be used for FLL-MEX and FLL-LAX.

Rumor also with this release is WN will announced
2 more international destinations from FLL to start in January.
Also the addition of a 3ed daily FLL-HAV flight.

My guess for new international service is KIN and CZM.
FLL domestic adds I see OMA,CVG,PWM and ORF.

Flyguy

Any chance IND gets some love

Maybe SYR can finally get in on the SW action.

I am still going to assume there aren't going to be many new adds. I think they are going to be filling in frequency on routes they cut back on in the previous updates.

Any new adds, I would guess would be to warm weather places.

The FLL-HAV I can see since they have publicly said they are wanting to add a 3rd flight.

MCO-DTW extension through the end of April, 737-700 morning DTW departure late afternoon MCO departure.

wnflyguy wrote:

Well the Easter/start of spring break holiday season will be released on July 27.
There's lots of talk that FLL will see some domestic growth in this schedule release. With a few new cities getting nonstop service.

I believe the Round 2 of MEX slots open up as well so 2 of those new aircraft can be used for FLL-MEX and FLL-LAX.

Flyguy

And last year "there was lots of talk" that WN was expected to announce FLL-SAN...

On July 27 we'll see if anything at all happens with FLL .

bb

MHT-FLL?

FLL-ROC should happen. Allegiant is off the route...there's nothing between ROC and South Florida.

SANFan wrote:

wnflyguy wrote:

Well the Easter/start of spring break holiday season will be released on July 27.
There's lots of talk that FLL will see some domestic growth in this schedule release. With a few new cities getting nonstop service.

I believe the Round 2 of MEX slots open up as well so 2 of those new aircraft can be used for FLL-MEX and FLL-LAX.

Flyguy

And last year "there was lots of talk" that WN was expected to announce FLL-SAN...

On July 27 we'll see if anything at all happens with FLL .

bb

Unfortunately I've Heard Red Eyes and Hawaii been officially pushed to 2019.
I wouldn't expect any West Coast FLL until RedEYE flying starts. Other wise it will not have any feed to international destinations.

Flyguy

wnflyguy wrote:

SANFan wrote:

wnflyguy wrote:

Well the Easter/start of spring break holiday season will be released on July 27.
There's lots of talk that FLL will see some domestic growth in this schedule release. With a few new cities getting nonstop service.

I believe the Round 2 of MEX slots open up as well so 2 of those new aircraft can be used for FLL-MEX and FLL-LAX.

Flyguy

And last year "there was lots of talk" that WN was expected to announce FLL-SAN...

On July 27 we'll see if anything at all happens with FLL .

bb

Unfortunately I've Heard Red Eyes and Hawaii been officially pushed to 2019.
I wouldn't expect any West Coast FLL until RedEYE flying starts. Other wise it will not have any feed to international destinations.

Flyguy

Although I think red eyes could open up a new round of transcon flying (including connx over FLL), it's not unreasonable to think WN may enter the fray ex-FLL if only to grow their footing in the South Florida market. They're on SAN-MCO/TPA, after all.

Will Southwest add nonstop service to TPA from LAX and OAK? Even though there is a significant LCC presence in Tampa, Los Angeles, and the San Francisco Bay Area, Delta is currently the only airline to serve TPA nonstop from the Greater Los Angeles area and United is currently the only airline to serve TPA nonstop from the San Francisco Bay Area. The LAX-SFO and TPA-SFO routes are two of the largest routes in the contiguous U.S. that are currently served nonstop by only 1 legacy carrier, and Southwest could add nonstop service to TPA from LAX and OAK in order to provide competition that is really needed on the Los Angeles-Tampa and San Francisco Bay Area-Tampa routes.

SANFan wrote:

wnflyguy wrote:

Well the Easter/start of spring break holiday season will be released on July 27.
There's lots of talk that FLL will see some domestic growth in this schedule release. With a few new cities getting nonstop service.

I believe the Round 2 of MEX slots open up as well so 2 of those new aircraft can be used for FLL-MEX and FLL-LAX.

Flyguy

And last year "there was lots of talk" that WN was expected to announce FLL-SAN...

On July 27 we'll see if anything at all happens with FLL .

bb

There's no room for 2 airlines on the route IMO. jetBlue beat them to it. Oh well.

my $0.02:
FLL-ORF, MHT, BOS if they're brave, and ROC...maybe some international adds. We'll have a good vibe for how international is doing based on how they play it with this extension.

Desperately need a 13th OAK-BUR!!!

Seriously though I doubt PWM or the like ( MHT ISP PVD ROC) will see anything new.
All the returning seasonal flights is all I am expecting, and a LGB-DEN flight....

jco613 wrote:

SANFan wrote:

And last year "there was lots of talk" that WN was expected to announce FLL-SAN...
bb

There's no room for 2 airlines on the route IMO. jetBlue beat them to it. Oh well.
my $0.02:

And AA flying SAN-MIA as well.

You're probably right; that's why I was surprised to hear "lots of talk" last year that WN was probably going to start flying between FLL and SAN.

And in the OP of this thread, the poster seems to me to be mentioning the possibility of FLL-LAX starting around Easter 2018, while later, in reply #9, he states:

Unfortunately I've Heard Red Eyes and Hawaii been officially pushed to 2019.
I wouldn't expect any West Coast FLL until RedEYE flying starts. Other wise it will not have any feed to international destinations.
Flyguy

I'm a bit confused. And not for the first time.

I think the solution is to just ignore all the "I heard..." and "There was lots of talk that..." and wait for July 27... Most of the time, 'all the talk' ends up being just that.

bb

SANFan wrote:

I think the solution is to just ignore all the "I heard..." and "There was lots of talk that..." and wait for July 27... Most of the time, 'all the talk' ends up being just that.

bb

I agree because typically what flyguy hears turns out to be a load of bull and never happens in the schedule release

SANFan wrote:

I think the solution is to just ignore all the "I heard..." and "There was lots of talk that..." and wait for July 27... Most of the time, 'all the talk' ends up being just that.

bb

Yep. I have learned to temper expectations after getting my hopes up too many times..... A lot more rumors turn out to be just rumors than anything that pans out. That said, hearing everyone's thoughts can be interesting.

Looking for a BDL-BNA.... still a big hole there that needs to be filled/restored.

I would really like to see CVG-PHX, which is a very underserved route. I think CVG-FLL is also pretty likely. Hoping CVG sees some new flights!

wnflyguy wrote:

Well the Easter/start of spring break holiday season will be released on July 27. The week of Easter it's rumored WN
Will be back up to pre 737-300 retirement fleet count.
And should be up 5+ new 7378MAX aircraft coming in on line the week before Easter.

There's lots of talk that FLL will see some domestic growth in this schedule release.
With a few new cities getting nonstop service.

I believe the Round 2 of MEX slots open up as well so 2 of those new aircraft can be used for FLL-MEX and FLL-LAX.

Rumor also with this release is WN will announced
2 more international destinations from FLL to start in January.
Also the addition of a 3ed daily FLL-HAV flight.

My guess for new international service is KIN and CZM.
FLL domestic adds I see OMA,CVG,PWM and ORF.

Flyguy

Typo on my part.
2nd round of MEXICO city add should be FLL-MEX and LAX-MEX not FLL-LAX.

Flyguy

Will Southwest be announcing DAL-MSP and DAL-CLE nonstop service or weekend DAL-PBI nonstop service with its 7/27 schedule extension?

Did wn ever do BDL-BNA?

tomaheath wrote:

Did wn ever do BDL-BNA?

Yeah from 1999-2011ish

Still hoping for BNA-PDX

Looking for a second CLT-DAL. And maybe a CLT-FLL.

There is significant demand for flights from Houston Hobby to San Jose (CA), Sacramento, Columbus (OH), and Philadelphia, even though these 4 destinations are not currently served nonstop from Houston Hobby. Southwest could add nonstop service from HOU to SJC and SMF, add year-round nonstop service to CMH from HOU, and revive HOU-PHL nonstop service.

There is significant demand for flights from Houston Hobby to New York City, even though Southwest only does 2 daily nonstops to LGA from HOU and even though jetBlue only does 1 daily nonstop to JFK from HOU. There appears to be enough demand for Southwest to revive HOU-EWR nonstop service since LGA is a slot-restricted airport and since there are only 3 daily nonstop flights from Houston Hobby to NYC. Why would Southwest discontinue HOU-EWR nonstop service if there is so much demand for HOU-NYC flights?

There is significant demand for flights to Buffalo, NY from both Houston airports, even though BUF does not have any nonstop service to either Houston airport. Will Southwest add nonstop service from HOU to BUF?

There is also significant demand for flights from Houston to Cincinnati, Cleveland, Detroit, Minneapolis/St. Paul, San Francisco, and Washington Dulles, even though these 4 destinations currently do not have nonstop service out of Houston Hobby. Southwest could add nonstop service from HOU to at least CVG, CLE, DTW, and MSP, and possibly to SFO and IAD.

wnflyguy wrote:

FLL domestic adds I see OMA,CVG,PWM and ORF.
Flyguy

Nope, not yet, no way!, maybe
CVG could grow, but I see other adds before this
ORF, maybe but it just seems WN doesn't have much planned for growth there
PWM? It seems to do well with its 2-4 BWI flights, but nothing else gets traction. Attempts at temporary MDW and MCO adds fizzled. I can't see PWM-FLL until MCO is successful.

jco613 wrote:

my $0.02:
FLL-ORF, MHT, BOS if they're brave, and ROC...maybe some international adds. We'll have a good vibe for how international is doing based on how they play it with this extension.

Reasonable guesses in my opinion. Both ORF and MHT have fallen victim to cut backs to fund growth opportunities at big city airports and neither has really recovered. MHT-FLL seemed to have good loads and fares, but fell so the traffic could be funneled through BWI and prop-up those flights and free up a plane. Some travelers were willing to connect and others drove to Boston for JetBlue nonstops. WN would have to lure the defectors back to make FLL work from MHT. Is WN willing to take that on? Could also be a shot across the JetBlue bow, in case they were thinking of starting MHT. FLL would be a likely target.

BOS is a deep market, and even if local flyers avoid WN, WN could make it work on reverse traffic. But how does WN fight the B6 frequency?

ROC? I wonder why WN doesn't grow ROC more? FLL is not an unreasonable guess.

I've been guessing that FLL feeder flights were going to be added during the last few schedule updates, and now I'm going to try a different tact. Instead of adding feeder flights from new cities, I'm going with better timing existing flights to improve connectivity at FLL.

This schedule isn't one that traditionally goes all-in on seasonal add-backs, so I'm not going to bite on much growth this cycle and instead, I'm thinking about spring break adds.

I also think a few long haul nonstops that were dropped and fed through hubs could come back with the Max. However, WN hasn't shown much desire to focus the aircraft on niche routes. It shows up all over the map.

wnflyguy wrote:

SANFan wrote:

wnflyguy wrote:

Well the Easter/start of spring break holiday season will be released on July 27.
There's lots of talk that FLL will see some domestic growth in this schedule release. With a few new cities getting nonstop service.

I believe the Round 2 of MEX slots open up as well so 2 of those new aircraft can be used for FLL-MEX and FLL-LAX.

Flyguy

And last year "there was lots of talk" that WN was expected to announce FLL-SAN...

On July 27 we'll see if anything at all happens with FLL .

bb

Unfortunately I've Heard Red Eyes and Hawaii been officially pushed to 2019.
I wouldn't expect any West Coast FLL until RedEYE flying starts. Other wise it will not have any feed to international destinations.

Flyguy

And you should probably recheck who you "hear" things from. Who makes up this stuff?

southwest1675 wrote:

tomaheath wrote:

Did wn ever do BDL-BNA?

Yeah from 1999-2011ish

that needs to come back!

jco613 wrote:

my $0.02:
ROC? I wonder why WN doesn't grow ROC more? FLL is not an unreasonable guess.

They really should. Start FLL and bring back MDW.

Will Southwest add nonstop service out of OAK to SAT, MSP, and IND? While all three of these cities are served nonstop by United out of SFO, Southwest does not have any nonstop service to the San Francisco Bay Area from these three cities, and these three cities do not have any nonstop service out of OAK.

My guess for MSP: RSW continues daily over Spring Break. MCO and TPA are added back as seasonal, Saturday (or maybe weekend) only flights. It's been this way for the past handful of years and will probably continue.
Perhaps LAS will return as it was during this time last year as 1x daily.

In general, I suppose there could be some Caribbean additions to the overall WN market, such as via FLL, but I would believe this is all we will see since this is the Spring Break schedule only. I believe it stops early April, so we are only talking about 5-6 weeks of schedule extension.

Thoughts?

Would like to see MEM/FLL added.

SyracuseAvGeek wrote:

Maybe SYR can finally get in on the SW action.

Could not agree more. SW should have come to SYR years ago. Inept local leadership (e.g., City Hall) did their best to prevent this from happening by maintaining high landing fees. Now that the airport is under the umbrella of an airport authority, maybe we can hope for a more common sense and business friendly approach. The airport has the location and infrastructure, and the catchment area is ripe for supporting more air service. If I still lived there, I'd be screaming bloody murder at the prospect of having to drive to ALB or ROC for reasonably priced flights. The folks at the SW counter in ALB (and I presume the same happens in ROC) will tell you that not a day goes by that they don't get complaints from passengers about the lack of SW service in SYR.

SyracuseAvGeek wrote:

Maybe SYR can finally get in on the SW action.

Could not agree more. SW should have come to SYR years ago. Inept local leadership (e.g., City Hall) did their best to prevent this from happening by maintaining high landing fees. Now that the airport is under the umbrella of an airport authority, maybe we can hope for a more common sense and business friendly approach. The airport has the location and infrastructure, and the catchment area is ripe for supporting more air service. If I still lived there, I'd be screaming bloody murder at the prospect of having to drive to ALB or ROC for reasonably priced flights. The folks at the SW counter in ALB (and I presume the same happens in ROC) will tell you that not a day goes by that they don't get complaints from passengers about the lack of SW service in SYR.

jco613 wrote:

southwest1675 wrote:

tomaheath wrote:

Did wn ever do BDL-BNA?

Yeah from 1999-2011ish

that needs to come back!

PDEW data shows the flight should have never been cut.

TucsonDave wrote:

SyracuseAvGeek wrote:

Maybe SYR can finally get in on the SW action.

Could not agree more. SW should have come to SYR years ago. Inept local leadership (e.g., City Hall) did their best to prevent this from happening by maintaining high landing fees. Now that the airport is under the umbrella of an airport authority, maybe we can hope for a more common sense and business friendly approach. The airport has the location and infrastructure, and the catchment area is ripe for supporting more air service. If I still lived there, I'd be screaming bloody murder at the prospect of having to drive to ALB or ROC for reasonably priced flights. The folks at the SW counter in ALB (and I presume the same happens in ROC) will tell you that not a day goes by that they don't get complaints from passengers about the lack of SW service in SYR.

Well I mean, if I'm SYR City Hall, I don't want Air Nambia flying there either...but that's just me.

WN isn't going to be coming to SYR anytime soon, that needs to be realized. One of the main reasons being exactly what was mentioned above- one of the reasons ALB and ROC work so well (specifically ROC) is because of the flow through of people from SYR flying out. There's a decent amount of SYR folks making the drive to ROC to fly WN. I don't see WN risking making ROC (and to a much lesser extent ALB) unstable to a degree just to start SYR. For all I know I'm wrong, I mean the comical part about these threads is that every single post here is simply speculation. But I'd be immensely surprised to see SYR.

G4 ROC-FLL was doomed from the start because of lack of promotion, as well as some pretty significant local issues at the station. MCAA has been saying for a few months now that they are willing to subsidize the route in the beginning stages to help it get off the ground, if WN picks it up. Now is the time for WN to make their move.

ROCDLFAN wrote:

WN isn't going to be coming to SYR anytime soon, that needs to be realized. One of the main reasons being exactly what was mentioned above- one of the reasons ALB and ROC work so well (specifically ROC) is because of the flow through of people from SYR flying out. There's a decent amount of SYR folks making the drive to ROC to fly WN. I don't see WN risking making ROC (and to a much lesser extent ALB) unstable to a degree just to start SYR. For all I know I'm wrong, I mean the comical part about these threads is that every single post here is simply speculation. But I'd be immensely surprised to see SYR.

G4 ROC-FLL was doomed from the start because of lack of promotion, as well as some pretty significant local issues at the station. MCAA has been saying for a few months now that they are willing to subsidize the route in the beginning stages to help it get off the ground, if WN picks it up. Now is the time for WN to make their move.

You have a very good point in they don't want to risk their ROC and ALB operations. A couple of years ago, B6 had service to BUF, ROC, and SYR but not ALB, but they decided to start service to ALB anyways, and not only did SYR service survive but they added a non-stop to FLL. I don't see why SW can't do the same thing.

People always speculate crazy adds that will never happen in these threads without considering the time period that it covers. This is a short extension that covers spring break.., that means any new flights will be one of two things:

1) Warm beach markets
2) competitive responses/reactions

Sorry BDL-BNA... March isnt the time for you, and same goes for adding SYR.

wnflyguy wrote:

Unfortunately I've Heard Red Eyes and Hawaii been officially pushed to 2019.

My well-placed source says ETOPS program will start early/mid-2018 with an entry into the Hawaii market in early late2018/early 2019. No workaround in the flight planning/aircraft routing system has been found to make red-eyes work right now...so, until you see/hear an announcement of a new planning system, I wouldn't expect them anytime soon. That said, they are actively seeking a new system.

As others have stated, expect few adds until mid/late-2018 when the fleet has re-normalized from the 300 retirements.

RL757PVD wrote:

People always speculate crazy adds that will never happen in these threads without considering the time period that it covers. This is a short extension that covers spring break.., that means any new flights will be one of two things:

1) Warm beach markets
2) competitive responses/reactions

Sorry BDL-BNA... March isnt the time for you, and same goes for adding SYR.

That’s spot-on. This upcoming schedule is the annual throw-everything-you-can-at-spring-break-travel release. Given the tight fleet it seems pretty unlikely that much of anything new will come unless they really feel they have to. I think it’s much more likely that new stuff would show up when the spring peak has passed and the April-May schedule comes out. It's a fairly common pattern with Southwest and other airlines. Throw capacity at the winter/spring vacationers and then use that capacity to open new stuff later in April/May.

SCHATC422 wrote:

Looking for a BDL-BNA.... still a big hole there that needs to be filled/restored.

I know that got cut for DEN but those two flight did very well. Especially the noon departure.

Last two extensions CLE picked up MKE and RSW. I'll got for the three-peat and say 2x daily CLE-DAL.

izbtmnhd wrote:

Last two extensions CLE picked up MKE and RSW. I'll got for the three-peat and say 2x daily CLE-DAL.

And CLE picked up ATL an extension or two before that.

WN has been slowly building up CLE without much fanfare the past few years. WN had shrunk to about 12 daily departures from CLE in 2014 and it will be up to 21 peak day departures this year. That's actually quite impressive considering their fleet constraints.

[twoid][/twoid]

RL757PVD wrote:

People always speculate crazy adds that will never happen in these threads without considering the time period that it covers. This is a short extension that covers spring break.., that means any new flights will be one of two things:

1) Warm beach markets
2) competitive responses/reactions

Sorry BDL-BNA... March isnt the time for you, and same goes for adding SYR.

This all seems like it makes the most sense to me.

I am guessing we will see FLL-MEX loaded in this extension. Not sure what else. Potentially FLL-SXM which has been rumored. Also would not be surprised to see MCO-OAK soon with the MAX, maybe not in this extension but I expect that eventually.

izbtmnhd wrote:

Last two extensions CLE picked up MKE and RSW. I'll got for the three-peat and say 2x daily CLE-DAL.

WN offers 1x daily DAL to BOS, CMH, CLT, DTW, MKE, PHL, PIT and RDU. Offering DAL-CLE at 2x daily would be out of pattern relative to those stations and CLE would get higher priority from the DAL side. The stations that have 2x or greater tend to be larger WN stations, shorter routes, or esteemed markets like LGA and DCA, where WN also decided to throw more capacity against a certain carrier, VX.

MaverickTTT wrote:

wnflyguy wrote:

Unfortunately I've Heard Red Eyes and Hawaii been officially pushed to 2019.

My well-placed source says ETOPS program will start early/mid-2018 with an entry into the Hawaii market in early late2018/early 2019. No workaround in the flight planning/aircraft routing system has been found to make red-eyes work right now...so, until you see/hear an announcement of a new planning system, I wouldn't expect them anytime soon. That said, they are actively seeking a new system.

As others have stated, expect few adds until mid/late-2018 when the fleet has re-normalized from the 300 retirements.

I've heard so many rumors about Hawaii service.
If I posted all of them it would make all The ANTI flyguy people heads blow up like the Hot pockets there mommies are probably cooking for them upstairs.

I've heard no Hawaii until 2019 with the 7377 MAX Etops.
But I've also heard the Sub Fleet of 737800NG Etops will be used from LAX,LAS and OAK for Hawaii service in summer 2018 but will have weight restrictions of 160 pax going westbound only.

As for there will be no RED EYES especially from Hawaii until late 2019 early 2020.

Hawaii got pushed back once and It's been almost 10yrs now so what's a couple more.

Now it's time to search Amazon for a New lazy boy and we're is my mom with that Hot pocket already doesn't she know I have a flipping airline to run!

Flyguy