Let me start out by saying I’ve read this forum for enough years that speculation without any hard evidence usually gets a sour response but that is why I put rumor in the title. Friend of mine works for B6 at DCA and apparently they were told SY will no longer serve DCA after January 7th. I’m not familiar with the amount of slots SY has but I dont believe they have many. Any ideas/ predictions who will get their slots?

That is true. The flight is not bookable after the 7th, and it also says so on Wikipedia (unless you just updated it)

I guess those two slots get returned and potentially parted out. One of the slots (I believe the 10 pm departure) was a limited entrant slot. At this point, I am not sure who (among those who would want a 10 pm departure) qualifies as limited-entrant at DCA given that B6 and WN both have a lot of slots (Frontier? AS really doesn't have use for such a slot unless they want to run an old-school tag from the west coast to BOS or RDU, etc.)

the 5:40 flight to Minnie sure would be valuable to any airline. I don't remember how they got that slot and I am sure everyone and their mother will apply for it (unless it was somehow limited to certain types of airlines or certain types of cities).

Could they not put the slots up for sale instead of just returning them?

I guess wn or b6 are the most likely to get those slots although anyone not aa probably has a chance.

tphuang wrote:

Could they not put the slots up for sale instead of just returning them?

I guess wn or b6 are the most likely to get those slots although anyone not aa probably has a chance.

I doubt that WN can play the "limited incumbent" card at this point since I believe they now have the 2nd or 3rd highest number of DCA slots after the windfall of slots they acquired several years ago when DL and UA were excluded from even taking part in the bidding on the divested AA/US slots.

https://www.transtats.bts.gov/airports.asp?pn=1 (depicts passenger count but gives a general idea of market share)

jetblastdubai wrote:

tphuang wrote:

Could they not put the slots up for sale instead of just returning them?

I guess wn or b6 are the most likely to get those slots although anyone not aa probably has a chance.

I doubt that WN can play the "limited incumbent" card at this point since I believe they now have the 2nd or 3rd highest number of DCA slots after the windfall of slots they acquired several years ago when DL and UA were excluded from even taking part in the bidding on the divested AA/US slots.

https://www.transtats.bts.gov/airports.asp?pn=1 (depicts passenger count but gives a general idea of market share)

But that doesn't include regionals though.

Your point still holds. I see on mwaa website that southwest is just slightly ahead of delta in second place. JetBlue and united are a fair bit behind them. Not sure united will get more slots given it's commanding position at Dulles. I guess as is a possibility here also. I can't see frontier getting more slots, but who knows.

SY should really just stick with charters. They are in no way set up to be a scheduled airline with such a small fleet, shaky history and unknown existence outside MSP.
Trying to fly business routes like DCA, NYC, etc .. waste of time. Focus on charters and vacation ... like your name suggests.

(Even if they do have probably the hottest looking livery out there!)

Since it's the Holiday Season of wishes and fantasies, and in a perfect world, the DOT would hold an emergency hearing to decide which airline would get that single 5PM slot for a temporary and very much needed flight to SAN; this would hold true until the next full-fledged Congressional Beyond-Perimeter hearing when such service would be permanently issued.

I believe DCA-SAN is either the 2nd or 3rd largest unserved domestic market and it's a very important route for military and government business and has been unserved since May 2014.

Now, unfortunately, back to the real world...

bb

F27500 wrote:

SY should really just stick with charters. They are in no way set up to be a scheduled airline with such a small fleet, shaky history and unknown existence outside MSP.
Trying to fly business routes like DCA, NYC, etc .. waste of time. Focus on charters and vacation ... like your name suggests.

(Even if they do have probably the hottest looking livery out there!)

you're not giving SY enough credit. They've run NYC, SEA, LAX, DCA, DAL for quite a few years and turned profits. I've flown them for business purposes a number of times, as have others.
They are much more than a charter operation, and the Florida/Mexico/Gulf routes have always been money makers.

Just cuz DCA isn't working now, doesn't mean they have to always fly toward the Sun

F27500 wrote:

SY should really just stick with charters. They are in no way set up to be a scheduled airline with such a small fleet, shaky history and unknown existence outside MSP.
Trying to fly business routes like DCA, NYC, etc .. waste of time. Focus on charters and vacation ... like your name suggests.

(Even if they do have probably the hottest looking livery out there!)

Of course no one knows about them. Their scheduled routes are literally built around MSP O&D (with a few of exceptions). Their issue is that they have virtually no growth options from MSP. They need to find different markets to focus on which they're finally doing. MSP itself is a great leisure market to focus on (high income metro with a strong leisure base because of the winters).

SANFan wrote:

Since it's the Holiday Season of wishes and fantasies, and in a perfect world, the DOT would hold an emergency hearing to decide which airline would get that single 5PM slot for a temporary and very much needed flight to SAN; this would hold true until the next full-fledged Congressional Beyond-Perimeter hearing when such service would be permanently issued.

I believe DCA-SAN is either the 2nd or 3rd largest unserved domestic market and it's a very important route for military and government business and has been unserved since May 2014.

Now, unfortunately, back to the real world...

bb

I don't think that would be allowed by law, would it?

SY began MSP-LAN-DCA in 2011, with an AR-21 slot, and added one daily MSP-DCA in 2013 (I don't know where the slot came from). When SY suspended LAN-DCA in 2015, AA took the AR-21 slot and continued the route. SY somehow maintained 2 daily DCA service both nonstop from MSP, but had to move one of the flights into the night (10pm).

This is the story I remember.. could be wrong.

cledaybuck wrote:

SANFan wrote:

Since it's the Holiday Season of wishes and fantasies, and in a perfect world, the DOT would hold an emergency hearing to decide which airline would get that single 5PM slot for a temporary and very much needed flight to SAN; this would hold true until the next full-fledged Congressional Beyond-Perimeter hearing when such service would be permanently issued.

I believe DCA-SAN is either the 2nd or 3rd largest unserved domestic market and it's a very important route for military and government business and has been unserved since May 2014.

Now, unfortunately, back to the real world...

bb

I don't think that would be allowed by law, would it?

It could be. DCA has a perimeter rule just like LGA, but unlike LGA it offers certain slots that are exempt from the perimeter rule. You do see DCA-LAX/SFO/SLC/DEN (DEN is not grandfathered in like it is at LaGuardia), etc. So if someone were to acquire a beyond-perimeter slot then yes, they could operate DCA-SAN (AS comes to mind).

cledaybuck wrote:

evank516 wrote:

cledaybuck wrote:

I don't think that would be allowed by law, would it?

It could be. DCA has a perimeter rule just like LGA, but unlike LGA it offers certain slots that are exempt from the perimeter rule. You do see DCA-LAX/SFO/SLC/DEN (DEN is not grandfathered in like it is at LaGuardia), etc. So if someone were to acquire a beyond-perimeter slot then yes, they could operate DCA-SAN (AS comes to mind).

Yeah, but I don't believe SY has any beyond perimeter slots, and I highly doubt anyone else is going to give one up.

No, they don't. I was explaining to the poster that there are exceptions to the perimeter rule at DCA as that was the impression I got by his/her question.

evank516 wrote:

cledaybuck wrote:

SANFan wrote:

Since it's the Holiday Season of wishes and fantasies, and in a perfect world, the DOT would hold an emergency hearing to decide which airline would get that single 5PM slot for a temporary and very much needed flight to SAN; this would hold true until the next full-fledged Congressional Beyond-Perimeter hearing when such service would be permanently issued.

I believe DCA-SAN is either the 2nd or 3rd largest unserved domestic market and it's a very important route for military and government business and has been unserved since May 2014.

Now, unfortunately, back to the real world...

bb

I don't think that would be allowed by law, would it?

It could be. DCA has a perimeter rule just like LGA, but unlike LGA it offers certain slots that are exempt from the perimeter rule. You do see DCA-LAX/SFO/SLC/DEN (DEN is not grandfathered in like it is at LaGuardia), etc. So if someone were to acquire a beyond-perimeter slot then yes, they could operate DCA-SAN (AS comes to mind).

Yeah, but I don't believe SY has any beyond perimeter slots, and I highly doubt anyone else is going to give one up.

Like I said, it was 99.9% fantasy that I was proposing. The Beyond-Perimeter slot awards are NOT transferable (to other cx) and with 3 or 4 recent exceptions, the awards are not changeable at all. The awards granted by the DOT (per Congress) are strictly carrier and route-specific, even time specific.

For my fantasy to happen, the DOT would have to first take that regular SY slot and transform it into a Beyond-Perimeter one, and then assign the actual route for the slot (DCA-SAN), as an emergency/temporary award, and THEN somehow figure out how to give it to Alaska Airlines (or someone!) See, nothing to it!

Oh yeah, and it ain't ever going to happen.

bb

So was SY doing better serving DCA-LAN-MSP alongside the one nonstop or did going to 2 nonstops cause them to suffer because of the bad slot times.

The loads must have been down. I was a bit surprised they're pulling out of DCA. Business centers were always a thing with SY.

tphuang wrote:

Could they not put the slots up for sale instead of just returning them?

I guess wn or b6 are the most likely to get those slots although anyone not aa probably has a chance.

The DCA slots aren't considered property owned by the airline and therefore can't be openly sold (anymore*). Airlines are allowed to lease the slots and have been allowed to trade them for other assets (a la DL-US slot swap), which very well maybe what SY is going to do.


* I don't have a full knowledge of the history of DCA (or JFK/LGA or other airport) slots to be able to give a definitive historical answer. However, NW very clearly bought EA's non-shuttle slots at bankruptcy auction (the very same slots DL and US traded) and TWA sold batches of slots to UA and, at the very end, 2 slots to ATA. I have no idea how TWA did that, if they were assets swaps a la the Delta-USAirways deal or a straight sale.

I read somewhere that YTZ is getting pre-clearance sometime in 2018. Could Porter Airlines maybe pick up the slots and fly YTZ-DCA?

A few ideas as to who could use the slots:
-Pittsburgh based OneJet has been expanding and could use the slots to start entering major business markets now that they're getting larger aircraft.
-Ditto for Ultimate Air Shuttle from Cincinnati
-Among smaller operators at DCA, JetBlue could probably use the late slot for a run up to BOS or Florida; WN could pitch DCA-OKC for the primetime slot

This is not a rumor - this has been published in the schedules for months...

SANFan wrote:

Since it's the Holiday Season of wishes and fantasies, and in a perfect world, the DOT would hold an emergency hearing to decide which airline would get that single 5PM slot for a temporary and very much needed flight to SAN; this would hold true until the next full-fledged Congressional Beyond-Perimeter hearing when such service would be permanently issued.

I believe DCA-SAN is either the 2nd or 3rd largest unserved domestic market and it's a very important route for military and government business and has been unserved since May 2014.

Now, unfortunately, back to the real world...

bb

Is the WN flight at 5:45 pm currently flying DCA-AUS-SAN not good enough? I've taken that flight 3 times now.

usflyer msp wrote:

This is not a rumor - this has been published in the schedules for months...

I posted it July 23, 2017.
viewtopic.php?t=1369125

futuresdpdcop wrote:

Is the WN flight at 5:45 pm currently flying DCA-AUS-SAN not good enough? I've taken that flight 3 times now.

Is a direct, 1-stop ever good enough? Especially in a market that today sees roughly 225-250 PDEW -- prolly significantly lower than it would be if there were nonstop service in the market.

I'm certainly pleased that SAN ended up with the WN r/t direct flight as part of the 2012 Beyond Perimeter hearing since that's much better than a connection. (AS is also on their way to adding a direct, thru-plane, 1-stop flight via DAL once their DAL-SAN nonstop starts in February.) And I know there are other cx offering 1-stop flights in one direction or the other, from time to time.

But nonstop is nonstop!

bb

p.s. I'm sure that WN r/t via AUS has been a popular one with San Diegans headed to DC and it's terrific that the carrier has continued to offer it for 5 years straight now.

The 10 PM arrival/departure doesn't need a slot.

The earlier slot is a new entrant/limited incumbent slot and the only Eligible carriers realistically are F9 and Elite Airways or perhaps Porter if they can get the start date and the opening of YTZ preclearance lined up (or operate the flight to YOW or YUL until YTZ preclearance opens).

drdisque wrote:

The 10 PM arrival/departure doesn't need a slot.

The earlier slot is a new entrant/limited incumbent slot and the only Eligible carriers realistically are F9 and Elite Airways or perhaps Porter if they can get the start date and the opening of YTZ preclearance lined up (or operate the flight to YOW or YUL until YTZ preclearance opens).

I could also see WestJet Encore interested in the slot as well.

SY has new ownership with a different vision. Wouldn’t be surprised if JFK is next

There was a huge kerfuffle about these slots when they were first awarded to Sun Country - because they were taken from Midwest/Republic. So Republic sued - and won and got the slots back:

https://www.flightglobal.com/news/artic ... ry-366641/

"Court ruling overturns DOT order on National slot exemptions for Sun Country

A US appeals court has overturned a year-old order by the US Department of Transportation (DOT) that cost Republic Airways Holdings two coveted slot exemptions at Washington National airport.

The court's decision will likely force Sun Country Airlines to give the slots back to Republic."

Which is what happened, but so that Sun Country shouldn't suffer because of its own actions, the DOT "created" two slots to give to Sun Country. So could the DOT now "uncreate" these slots, take them back and not award them to anyone?

mariner

mariner wrote:

Which is what happened, but so that Sun Country shouldn't suffer because of its own actions, the DOT "created" two slots to give to Sun Country. So could the DOT now "uncreate" these slots, take them back and not award them to anyone?

mariner

that's really interesting. I knew there was something about those slots; thanks for sharing.

If they keep the slots and deem them for limited players. Would any international carrier flying to a pre-clearance quality? Could we literally see EI (assuming the runway can support the MTOW of a 757 with fuel for 3300 mi) apply for SNN or DUB?

GSP psgr wrote:

A few ideas as to who could use the slots:
-Pittsburgh based OneJet has been expanding and could use the slots to start entering major business markets now that they're getting larger aircraft.
-Ditto for Ultimate Air Shuttle from Cincinnati
-Among smaller operators at DCA, JetBlue could probably use the late slot for a run up to BOS or Florida; WN could pitch DCA-OKC for the primetime slot

I could see B6 trying out DCA-ORH. The timing of a 10pm DCA departure and morning return would be perfect for ORH-based travelers who might pay a premium not the schlep up to BOS. This would mimic the recently announced JFK-ORH schedule, which also maximizes connections.

I used to handle the SY 73 at Dulles, always pretty good loads from what I can remember. I guess they moved to bring passengers closer to downtown.

Crews were always pleasant and if there were breakfasts left from the inbound, even enjoyed a nice meal between flights.

N717TW wrote:

If they keep the slots and deem them for limited players. Would any international carrier flying to a pre-clearance quality? Could we literally see EI (assuming the runway can support the MTOW of a 757 with fuel for 3300 mi) apply for SNN or DUB?

The specific case you mention - EI SNN or DUB - would be beyond the DCA perimeter of 1250 miles, so unless new "beyond perimeter" slots were created - which can only be done by Congress - the answer is no. Even with new "beyond perimeter" slots there is little reason to suppose the foreign airline would win the draw and there would be an outcry from the US airlines if they did.

To all intents and purposes, DCA is only available to "near" international airlines - Canadian (or closer Caribbean, I guess, Bahamas Air, eg).

The beyond perimeter slots that exist cannot be traded, they have to be used for the routes that DOT chose them for and if an airline no longer wants them they have to be given back to the DOT, who would, ordinarily, put them out for bid to other airlines. There is usually a DOT preference for either new airlines or "limited incumbent" airlines - usually defined as carriers with fewer than 5% of the slots at DCA.

mariner

I reiterate that SY only had one slot pair. The second flight operated so late that it did not require a slot pair.

Westjet has shied away from entering east coast markets with only 1x frequency, so I doubt they'd give it a go.

OneJet would probably have a hard time making a case for the slot with the business jets. Maybe if they said it would be one of their new ERJ-135 flights then they would have a chance. Although it's important to note that OneJet focuses on business markets with no nonstop service. There aren't many viable business centers within perimeter that don't already have nonstop service to DCA.

drdisque wrote:

I reiterate that SY only had one slot pair. The second flight operated so late that it did not require a slot pair.

Westjet has shied away from entering east coast markets with only 1x frequency, so I doubt they'd give it a go.

OneJet would probably have a hard time making a case for the slot with the business jets. Maybe if they said it would be one of their new ERJ-135 flights then they would have a chance. Although it's important to note that OneJet focuses on business markets with no nonstop service. There aren't many viable business centers within perimeter that don't already have nonstop service to DCA.

I think what you mean for SY's 10pm departure is "unassigned" or "unallocated slot". Every departure from DCA between 6 am and 11:59pm is assigned a slot. There are a certain number of slots assigned to commercial operations, then general aviation operations, etc. SY picked up the 10pm slot because nobody else wanted it. That may or may not still be the case.

From the FAA:
At DCA, the equivalent of IATA Level 3 slot controls are in place pursuant to the High Density Rule (14 CFR part 93 subparts K & S) to govern operations daily, from 6:00 am to 11:59 pm. During slot-controlled hours, regularly scheduled operations are limited to 48 per hour by regulation. Some additional operations are permitted by exemption on a limited basis pursuant to 49 U.S.C. §§ 41714 and 41718. For additional information concerning slot exemptions adjudicated by the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT), see
https://www.transportation.gov/policy/a ... exemptions.

mariner wrote:

N717TW wrote:

If they keep the slots and deem them for limited players. Would any international carrier flying to a pre-clearance quality? Could we literally see EI (assuming the runway can support the MTOW of a 757 with fuel for 3300 mi) apply for SNN or DUB?

The specific case you mention - EI SNN or DUB - would be beyond the DCA perimeter of 1250 miles, so unless new "beyond perimeter" slots were created - which can only be done by Congress - the answer is no. Even with new "beyond perimeter" slots there is little reason to suppose the foreign airline would win the draw and there would be an outcry from the US airlines if they did.

To all intents and purposes, DCA is only available to "near" international airlines - Canadian (or closer Caribbean, I guess, Bahamas Air, eg).

The beyond perimeter slots that exist cannot be traded, they have to be used for the routes that DOT chose them for and if an airline no longer wants them they have to be given back to the DOT, who would, ordinarily, put them out for bid to other airlines. There is usually a DOT preference for either new airlines or "limited incumbent" airlines - usually defined as carriers with fewer than 5% of the slots at DCA.

mariner

I feel like a huge dunce. I totally forgot the perimeter when I wrote this.