Is there any reason the LCC boom has largely avoided SLC? Something about the landing fees or airport/runway capacity? Only F9 flies there from usually other focus cities.

I always thought this was the last sensical place for AS to expand geographically, having tapped over its history Russia, California, transcontinental and Mexico. AS only added to SLC in retaliation to DL's Seattle expansion and has retreated on that, so I don't count the few flights they tried as a serious attempt.

Unlike DEN which has always hosted 2+ airlines as a hub, SLC has only ever really had Western/Delta. Delta very quickly found the airport to be a profitable link in their route network, and have maintained a large presence there every since. The metropolitan area, like fellow hub MSP, has a large number of people very loyal to DL. As such, other airlines have taken this into account, because as we all know, airlines ferociously compete for customers on their home turf. To all the majors, SLC will only ever be a spoke, Southwest is only going to offer what they know they profitably fill, and unless something changes drastically, Alaska will probably look to maintain its dominance at SEA and PDX rather than start a turf war for one city. This leaves the ULCC airlines, who are going to have to be very clear what market they are trying to attract, and whether they can profitably cater to this group. So far, they do not.

However, once the new SLC facilities are completed, the situation may change. Maybe there will be enough available gates for ULCC's?

In addition to 4-5 flights a day to Denver, Frontier has also launched service to Atlanta (kinda hilarious), Austin, Las Vegas, and San Antonio.

AS does have PHX, SAN, LAX, and SFO service still operating.

I could see WN possibly adding SLC-ATL nonstop service, despite both SLC and ATL both being DL hubs, since ATL is a focus city for WN and since WN already has nonstop service from ATL to most of the DL hub airports that are served by WN. WN would also be able to connect passengers to a few more East Coast destinations that aren't served nonstop from DEN, DAL, or MDW on WN from SLC if it adds SLC-ATL nonstop service.

WN could also bring back SLC-PDX, SLC-MCI, and MCI-STL nonstop service, and WN could also add SLC-AUS, SLC-BNA, and SLC-ONT nonstop service. WN could also extend SLC-HOU nonstop service to daily nonstop service from Saturday-only nonstop service since WN would be able to more easily connect passengers to CRP, HRL, MSY, Florida, and international destinations from SLC if it extends SLC-HOU nonstop service to daily nonstop service.

PSAatSAN4Ever wrote:

This leaves the ULCC airlines, who are going to have to be very clear what market they are trying to attract, and whether they can profitably cater to this group. So far, they do not.

However, once the new SLC facilities are completed, the situation may change. Maybe there will be enough available gates for ULCC's?

While NK could possibly enter SLC, most of the markets that NK would be serving nonstop from SLC are already served nonstop out of SLC on WN, F9, and/or B6.

SY could also add MSP-SLC nonstop service, and SY also already has nonstop service from MSP to a few other DL hub and focus city airports, including SEA, LAX, BOS, and JFK. There are also opportunities for SY to add nonstop service to the West Coast, Las Vegas, and Florida from SLC.

Even though G4 could possibly expand to SLC, G4 already serves PVU, which is near the south side of the Salt Lake City metropolitan area. While G4 only currently serves LAS and AZA nonstop from PVU, G4 could add nonstop service to destinations east of the Rockies such as AUS, IND, and CVG out of PVU.

winglet13 wrote:

AS does have PHX, SAN, LAX, and SFO service still operating.

Are you sure about PHX? With AA, DL, and WN in the market is there room for AS?

jplatts wrote:

PSAatSAN4Ever wrote:

This leaves the ULCC airlines, who are going to have to be very clear what market they are trying to attract, and whether they can profitably cater to this group. So far, they do not.

However, once the new SLC facilities are completed, the situation may change. Maybe there will be enough available gates for ULCC's?

While NK could possibly enter SLC, most of the markets that NK would be serving nonstop from SLC are already served nonstop out of SLC on WN, F9, and/or B6.

SY could also add MSP-SLC nonstop service, and SY also already has nonstop service from MSP to a few other DL hub and focus city airports, including SEA, LAX, BOS, and JFK. There are also opportunities for SY to add nonstop service to the West Coast, Las Vegas, and Florida from SLC.

Even though G4 could possibly expand to SLC, G4 already serves PVU, which is near the south side of the Salt Lake City metropolitan area. While G4 only currently serves LAS and AZA nonstop from PVU, G4 could add nonstop service to destinations east of the Rockies such as AUS, IND, and CVG out of PVU.

I could see SY expanding into SLC. It seems to fit their current expansions. Possibly a SLC-PDX/BNA/MSY/MIA would be some good additions.

We're dealing with a very similar situation at PDX.

NK and F9 have avoided PDX like the plague and their presence there is very minimal. They're not wanting to face the competition against AS, although SY will be entering the market with some new routes very soon, so I guess we'll see where that goes for them...

Delta has defending it aggressively. Spirit knows entry would create a fare war and they only interested in routes that make money. Southwest and B6 were fought off aggressively. Spirit or allegiant knows what entry would mean.

FA9295 wrote:

We're dealing with a very similar situation at PDX.

NK and F9 have avoided PDX like the plague and their presence there is very minimal.

Sorry, folks, but SLC and PDX just aren't very big prizes. PDX ranks #23 in domestic O&D passenger counts, and SLC #27. CLT is #28. They are all well-covered by their dominant carriers.

910A wrote:

winglet13 wrote:

AS does have PHX, SAN, LAX, and SFO service still operating.

Are you sure about PHX? With AA, DL, and WN in the market is there room for AS?

My bad. I was seeing their Marketing Code share designation on AA flights.

slcdeltarumd11 wrote:

Delta has defending it aggressively. Spirit knows entry would create a fare war and they only interested in routes that make money. Southwest and B6 were fought off aggressively. Spirit or allegiant knows what entry would mean.

In addition to DL defending SLC aggressively, most of the markets that NK would be serving nonstop from SLC already have nonstop service out of SLC on either WN or B6.

Also, the SLC metro area only has 1.2 million people, ranking 48 in the US. This puts them smaller than Louisville, Memphis, Richmond, Jacksonville, and others, and only slightly larger than Birmingham (AL) and Buffalo. For a city of its size, SLC is more than adequately served by DL as others have stated and I'm not sure a LCC would do well with the fortress hub, similar to CLT.

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Jake1993P wrote:

Also, the SLC metro area only has 1.2 million people, ranking 48 in the US. This puts them smaller than Louisville, Memphis, Richmond, Jacksonville, and others, and only slightly larger than Birmingham (AL) and Buffalo. For a city of its size, SLC is more than adequately served by DL as others have stated and I'm not sure a LCC would do well with the fortress hub, similar to CLT.

Thank you. The market is really nothing special compared to peer cities across the nation. They should be glad they have what they do.

Jake1993P wrote:

Also, the SLC metro area only has 1.2 million people, ranking 48 in the US. This puts them smaller than Louisville, Memphis, Richmond, Jacksonville, and others, and only slightly larger than Birmingham (AL) and Buffalo. For a city of its size, SLC is more than adequately served by DL as others have stated and I'm not sure a LCC would do well with the fortress hub, similar to CLT.

Yet for some reason, SLC suppports up to 4 flights a day to Europe. The others you mention have none. It seems to punch far about its weight due to other factors than population. Same with PDX.

Jake1993P wrote:

Also, the SLC metro area only has 1.2 million people, ranking 48 in the US. This puts them smaller than Louisville, Memphis, Richmond, Jacksonville, and others, and only slightly larger than Birmingham (AL) and Buffalo. For a city of its size, SLC is more than adequately served by DL as others have stated and I'm not sure a LCC would do well with the fortress hub, similar to CLT.

WN actually already has a much bigger presence at SLC than it does at SDF, MEM, RIC, JAX, BHM, and BUF, and there is also significantly greater demand for WN service out of SLC than out of SDF, MEM, RIC, JAX, BHM, and BUF.

One big difference between SLC and other similarly-sized U.S. metropolitan areas is that SDF, MEM, RIC, JAX, BHM, and BUF are all located within 140 miles of another WN station whereas SLC is not within 250 miles of any other WN station. Another big difference is SLC is a larger market by population than SDF, MEM, RIC, JAX, BHM, and BUF if the Provo and Ogden areas (both of which are part of the SLC CSA) are included.

BoeingGuy wrote:

Jake1993P wrote:

Also, the SLC metro area only has 1.2 million people, ranking 48 in the US. This puts them smaller than Louisville, Memphis, Richmond, Jacksonville, and others, and only slightly larger than Birmingham (AL) and Buffalo. For a city of its size, SLC is more than adequately served by DL as others have stated and I'm not sure a LCC would do well with the fortress hub, similar to CLT.

Yet for some reason, SLC suppports up to 4 flights a day to Europe. The others you mention have none. It seems to punch far about its weight due to other factors than population. Same with PDX.

A big reason for that, is because SLC is the primary airport for not only the Salt Lake City metro area, but (due to isolation) the entire Wasatch Front, which houses 80% of Utah's population and probably an even larger percentage of its economic generation.

PSAatSAN4Ever wrote:

Unlike DEN which has always hosted 2+ airlines as a hub, SLC has only ever really had Western/Delta.

KN also hubbed there, which is what brought WN in in the first place.

Lexy wrote:

The market is really nothing special compared to peer cities across the nation. They should be glad they have what they do.

I'm not so sure. LDS generates alot of traffic, especially for missions, and they have a fair bit of international travel as well. I'm not sure if they exclusively use DL for travel, but it woudln't surprise me.

BoeingGuy wrote:

Jake1993P wrote:

Also, the SLC metro area only has 1.2 million people, ranking 48 in the US. This puts them smaller than Louisville, Memphis, Richmond, Jacksonville, and others, and only slightly larger than Birmingham (AL) and Buffalo. For a city of its size, SLC is more than adequately served by DL as others have stated and I'm not sure a LCC would do well with the fortress hub, similar to CLT.

Yet for some reason, SLC suppports up to 4 flights a day to Europe. The others you mention have none. It seems to punch far about its weight due to other factors than population. Same with PDX.

And how many of these flights would be sustainable without connecting traffic from DL?

BoeingGuy wrote:

Jake1993P wrote:

Also, the SLC metro area only has 1.2 million people, ranking 48 in the US. This puts them smaller than Louisville, Memphis, Richmond, Jacksonville, and others, and only slightly larger than Birmingham (AL) and Buffalo. For a city of its size, SLC is more than adequately served by DL as others have stated and I'm not sure a LCC would do well with the fortress hub, similar to CLT.

Yet for some reason, SLC suppports up to 4 flights a day to Europe. The others you mention have none. It seems to punch far about its weight due to other factors than population. Same with PDX.

No question. Population is a pointless statistic, SLC has high value business and tourism that help it punch well above it weight. Delta Is very profitibale there and that's why they defend it. It works in the legacy model. The ULCCs have no interest in turf wars they just want to make money and will go after lower hanging fruit. The CEO of allegiant said they fly no routes that lose money , if they fail they cancel them. Spirit and allegiant don't care about networks or anything it's what route make money. There is just lower hanging fruit than fighting delta, southwest and JetBlue on well served routes out of SLC.

All these comments make sense in a vacuum, but the LCCs have built-up far smaller cities (O&D heavy or not) than SLC- like SAT TUL TTN and the LCCs have entered plenty of more profitable fortress hubs than SLC is to DL like DFW ATL PHL IAH. They have had no problem being the 3rd or 4th carrier on some routs.

crescent wrote:

All these comments make sense in a vacuum, but the LCCs have built-up far smaller cities (O&D heavy or not) than SLC- like SAT TUL TTN and the LCCs have entered plenty of more profitable fortress hubs than SLC is to DL like DFW ATL PHL IAH. They have had no problem being the 3rd or 4th carrier on some routs.

DFW, ATL, PHL and IAH all have a significantly higher O&D market than SLC does. With that being said though, I think that one factor (aside from DL, of course) that drives NK out of the game, is B6's SLC presence, and NK doesn't want to get in on the risky battle that DL and B6 are currently having at the moment. I think it would be interesting to see B6's reaction to NK adding SLC-FLL/MCO. Of course, DL could survive that, but B6 would very likely exit those routes altogether.

Another thing. Isn't F9 significantly increasing their presence at SLC? They currently offer flights from SLC to ATL, AUS, DEN, RSW, LAS and SAT. Their SLC-ATL poses an interesting scenario, because that is definitely a route where DL would hike the price on, since it's from one of their major hubs to another, with minimal competition. So on this particular route, F9 is looking to attract the O&D market on SLC-ATL to those who are looking for a much cheaper price then what DL has to offer to them.

FA9295 wrote:

Another thing. Isn't F9 significantly increasing their presence at SLC? They currently offer flights from SLC to ATL, AUS, DEN, RSW, LAS and SAT. Their SLC-ATL poses an interesting scenario, because that is definitely a route where DL would hike the price on, since it's from one of their major hubs to another, with minimal competition. So on this particular route, F9 is looking to attract the O&D market on SLC-ATL to those who are looking for a much cheaper price then what DL has to offer to them.

I think that WN could add SLC-ATL nonstop service if F9 drops SLC-ATL nonstop service since WN already has nonstop service to ATL from some other DL hub airports and since WN would be able to offer connections from SLC to a few more East Coast destinations that aren't served nonstop from DEN, DAL, or MDW on WN.

slcdeltarumd11 wrote:

The ULCCs have no interest in turf wars they just want to make money and will go after lower hanging fruit. The CEO of allegiant said they fly no routes that lose money , if they fail they cancel them. Spirit and allegiant don't care about networks or anything it's what route make money. There is just lower hanging fruit than fighting delta, southwest and JetBlue on well served routes out of SLC.

G4 is already at PVU, and G4 could add nonstop service to destinations east of the Rockies such as AUS, CVG, IND, SFB, and PIE from PVU. PVU is also close enough to the south side of the SLC metro area to serve as a viable alternative to SLC for those on the south side of the SLC metro area.

Jake1993P wrote:

Also, the SLC metro area only has 1.2 million people, ranking 48 in the US. This puts them smaller than Louisville, Memphis, Richmond, Jacksonville, and others, and only slightly larger than Birmingham (AL) and Buffalo. For a city of its size, SLC is more than adequately served by DL as others have stated and I'm not sure a LCC would do well with the fortress hub, similar to CLT.

BTW the Buffalo market is more that 1.2 million. Yes, the city + suburbs. But the catchment area for Buffalo is Southern Ontario, Rochester, and part of Pennsylvania.

Buffalomatt1027 wrote:

Jake1993P wrote:

Also, the SLC metro area only has 1.2 million people, ranking 48 in the US. This puts them smaller than Louisville, Memphis, Richmond, Jacksonville, and others, and only slightly larger than Birmingham (AL) and Buffalo. For a city of its size, SLC is more than adequately served by DL as others have stated and I'm not sure a LCC would do well with the fortress hub, similar to CLT.

BTW the Buffalo market is more that 1.2 million. Yes, the city + suburbs. But the catchment area for Buffalo is Southern Ontario, Rochester, and part of Pennsylvania.

And i’ll say the same for SLC. SLC is categorized as a small msa because of the complicated geography but the CSA entails around 2.5m people. Additionally northern idaho and parts of wyoming are also in the catchement area for SLC bringing it to around 3-3.5m including much of the rest of the state.

There are a lot of factors people aren’t considering as to why SLC punches above its weight but can’t seem to sustain any other carrier besides delta:

- The intermountain west is comparatively wealthy
- SLC is a legacy hub for Delta
- SLC has one of, if not the lowest operating cost of any major hub
- Delta has committed almost a billion into the reconstruction project and is heavily invested in SLC’s future.
- SLC has good geography relative to the rest of the US

All of these reasons make SLC a great hub for Delta. Here’s why it would suck for anybody else:

- It’s still a relatively small city for the size of the airport. The only comparable cities to it are HNL and CLT, which are either... well, Hawaii, or a legacy fortress hub
- Delta controls between 70 and 80 percent of the traffic
- Delta is very developed as “the” carrier for SLC
- The facilities at the moment, for everybody but especially a new LCC are decrepit and sad. This will be different in the future but in the mean time Delta has elected to stop connecting growth

Like CLT and MSP, SLC provides a great legacy carrier environment. But it’s simply too small to support another carrier.

SLC is a huge airport for a city the size of Salt Lake City. Although the catchment area is big in size, not huge in population.

The airport has the non-stop international flights it has because of the hub.

I don't know what the contract The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has, but my guess would be Delta and I would also guess it's the biggest contract Delta has in Utah. That being said, they're not filling every plane with missionaries. So while a factor, not a huge factor.

As for LCCs, it would be suicide. G4 has made it work in Ogden and Provo, so they have the monopoly on those sub-Salt Lake markets. But SY or NK would just got slammed by Delta and I don't believe it work well in their favor.

flyoregon wrote:

SLC is a huge airport for a city the size of Salt Lake City. Although the catchment area is big in size, not huge in population.

The airport has the non-stop international flights it has because of the hub.

I don't know what the contract The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has, but my guess would be Delta and I would also guess it's the biggest contract Delta has in Utah. That being said, they're not filling every plane with missionaries. So while a factor, not a huge factor.

As for LCCs, it would be suicide. G4 has made it work in Ogden and Provo, so they have the monopoly on those sub-Salt Lake markets. But SY or NK would just got slammed by Delta and I don't believe it work well in their favor.

The LDS church has contracts with all legacy airlines. You cannot escape their henchman

flyoregon wrote:

As for LCCs, it would be suicide. G4 has made it work in Ogden and Provo, so they have the monopoly on those sub-Salt Lake markets. But SY or NK would just got slammed by Delta and I don't believe it work well in their favor.

While G4 currently only serves AZA nonstop from OGD, OGD is only 35 miles from Downtown Salt Lake City, and G4 could expand at OGD instead of starting service out of SLC.

G4 could add nonstop service to either OGD or PVU from West Coast airports that do not currently have any nonstop service to SLC such as BLI or SCK. G4 could also add nonstop service to OGD or PVU from destinations east of the Rockies such as AUS, CVG, and IND. In addition, G4 also could add OGD-LAS nonstop service.

If G4 wants to expand in the SLC market, G4 could add nonstop service to BLI, CVG, LAS, and SCK from OGD instead of starting service out of SLC.

PSAatSAN4Ever wrote:

Unlike DEN which has always hosted 2+ airlines as a hub, SLC has only ever really had Western/Delta.

KN also hubbed there, which is what brought WN in in the first place.

Yep, you are indeed correct, and I stand corrected. I completely forgot that Morris Air actually did the hub system...

The Morris Air hub at SLC last just short of two years, until WN took over and dismantled the hub. Was that time enough for Delta to even consider them a threat?

Utah frequent fliers and business travelers are very loyal to DL, but so are the casual travelers. I have friends who only fly once per year but actively collect and hoard Skymiles in anticipation of a future free flight. I also see a lot of people that I know to be infrequent travelers that carry DL AmEx cards.

I think that the Southwest presence at SLC is about right, especially considering the proximity to major WN stations at LAS and DEN. They fly to the most important destinations and avoid taking risks. That's what Southwest does best.

I think that JetBlue has a very positive reputation here -- people appreciate that they employ a lot of people in SLC, and I think that the historic Neeleman ties to the area are also a factor. But reputation isn't enough to compete with DL's superior schedule for business travelers. My perception is that they mostly get vacation traffic.

I'm curious to see what happens here with Moxie.

It's not really an LCC, but the carrier that I most want to see at SLC is Hawaiian. Do the 321s have range for SLC-LIH?

It is interesting to note that PVU is the largest market for G4 from AZA. There is a ton of VFR traffic on that route. It seems like they might be trying to catch some of that magic with the recent announcements of PVU-TUS and AZA-SGU -- It will be interesting to see if those will last. There is a very price-sensitive element of the SLC population that would happily drive to PVU or OGD (they are both really close) for a deal from LCCs (and G4 seems to be doing well), but I think that DL is willing to use basic economy fares to match any offering that might come along in those places. I don't think that new entrants would find it much easier to start at those airports than at SLC.

redzeppelin wrote:

I'm curious to see what happens here with Moxie.

It's not really an LCC, but the carrier that I most want to see at SLC is Hawaiian. Do the 321s have range for SLC-LIH?

It is interesting to note that PVU is the largest market for G4 from AZA. There is a ton of VFR traffic on that route. It seems like they might be trying to catch some of that magic with the recent announcements of PVU-TUS and AZA-SGU -- It will be interesting to see if those will last. There is a very price-sensitive element of the SLC population that would happily drive to PVU or OGD (they are both really close) for a deal from LCCs (and G4 seems to be doing well), but I think that DL is willing to use basic economy fares to match any offering that might come along in those places. I don't think that new entrants would find it much easier to start at those airports than at SLC.

I'm also curious about Moxy's presence in Utah. Neeleman recently stated that his tech and customer service force would likely be in Utah, much like B6. He has also said that most of the airline's routes wouldn't have any direct competition with the utilization of secondary airports. With all this in mind, PVU seems to fit the initial criteria. It's no secret that Utah County's and southern Salt Lake County's tech scene is exploding making PVU a viable option for future air service growth. I wouldn't be shocked if Neeleman brings Moxy to PVU and offers a number of key point-to-point markets (SFO/SJC, SEA, LAX, DEN, etc.) Granted, all this would hinge on PVU's ability to provide the necessary terminal and parking facilities. While not directly competing as an LCC in SLC, Moxy could make a small dent at PVU if executed effectively.

On the Hawaiian note, I definitely can see HA coming to SLC once the new terminal is constructed. SLC-Hawaii is a huge market that DL currently has all to themselves. I don't think the 321s have the range, but HA could probably fill a widebody 3-4X per week from SLC easy.

One more item:
I think that there is room to attack DL on the fringes of the schedule. DL's biggest weakness in SLC may be the scheduling of flights around connection banks. The timings often are not ideal for SLC O&D, and it can be hard for SLC-based business travelers to make day trips to important regional cities on DL. SFO is a good example. The earliest DL flight to SFO tomorrow leaves at 8:42 (allows connections from the first arrival bank) and arrives in SFO at 10:09. The last flight back from SFO departs at 16:56. With realistic ground travel times, you can't really plan to be in downtown SFO before noon, and you won't have much more than 2 hours before you need to head back. The same problem exists at some degree for many other cities, from BOI to PHX and beyond. I feel like SLC business travelers get stuck with a lot of extra hotel nights in order to accommodate DL's bank schedules.

I'm a loyal DL flyer, but I've personally used UA and AS in the past in order to get earlier arrivals or later departures to/from SFO. I don't know which routes really have enough demand for an LCC to bother with, but I think that there is some opportunity to steal O&D traffic by offering more early departures and late returns.

LAX772LR wrote:

:shakehead: KN also hubbed there, which is what brought WN in in the first place.

Yeah, I saw this thread and wondered to myself if pretty much every poster was too young to be aware of the existence of Morris Air... They were a bit over 40 daily departures to a dozen or so cities from SLC when they were merged into WN. WN is still around 30 departures in summer but that's down quite a bit from their peak; DEN serves as their big nexus for connections in the Mountain region now.

FA9295 wrote:

I think that one factor (aside from DL, of course) that drives NK out of the game, is B6's SLC presence

Nah, WN is a much bigger factor at SLC than B6; they've been the alternative to DL at SLC for a quarter century (and even longer when you include the KN heritage).

Jake1993P wrote:

Also, the SLC metro area only has 1.2 million people, ranking 48 in the US. This puts them smaller than Louisville, Memphis, Richmond, Jacksonville, and others, and only slightly larger than Birmingham (AL) and Buffalo. For a city of its size, SLC is more than adequately served by DL as others have stated and I'm not sure a LCC would do well with the fortress hub, similar to CLT.

The real issue isn't necessarily the fortress hub, but rather the fact that (like CLT, actually) the local market is still relatively small, even with a geographically large catchment region. Thanks to the comprehensive set of non-stops, both SLC and CLT tend to draw from very broad geographic regions. But with the small local market, it's relatively difficult to stimulate enough incremental traffic to fill one or more daily mainline-sized aircraft outside of the very largest city-pair markets.

redzeppelin wrote:

I think that there is room to attack DL on the fringes of the schedule. DL's biggest weakness in SLC may be the scheduling of flights around connection banks. The timings often are not ideal for SLC O&D, and it can be hard for SLC-based business travelers to make day trips to important regional cities on DL. SFO is a good example. The earliest DL flight to SFO tomorrow leaves at 8:42 (allows connections from the first arrival bank) and arrives in SFO at 10:09. The last flight back from SFO departs at 16:56. With realistic ground travel times, you can't really plan to be in downtown SFO before noon, and you won't have much more than 2 hours before you need to head back.

...

I'm a loyal DL flyer, but I've personally used UA and AS in the past in order to get earlier arrivals or later departures to/from SFO. I don't know which routes really have enough demand for an LCC to bother with, but I think that there is some opportunity to steal O&D traffic by offering more early departures and late returns.

If you weren't so stuck to DL and SFO as the airport, you'd realize that WN has a departure to OAK which would get you into downtown San Francisco by 9 AM (arrives OAK at 0730) and a return from OAK at 9:30 PM (although the 12:15 AM arrival is unpleasant).