HeyHey wrote:

Fargo wrote:

That is because RDU was within the range of a 752, and it was pretty successful actually. It is now on a 763 and is daily or near daily year round (I believe it may be 5x week or so in the very slow winter months). But we have to remember RDU has had TATL service since 1994 and is a bit bigger and further economically developed than BNA. As for AUS, I'd argue they are on a completely different level than BNA/RDU. The MSA proper may be around the same size, but they serve a much larger catchment area (closer to 3-5 million people depending on how you look at it), they have a bigger business community and advanced tech sector and it is the state capital of the 10th largest economy in the world. It's no wonder BA is flying daily 744's/77W's and LH (a conservative airline when it comes to non-hub routes in the US) just started service there, with DL to CDG and a TPAC flight likely around the corner.

None of this is to say BNA isn't significant in it's own right, we (I live in the Nashville area FYI) are growing rapidly as well. We'll get more European service eventually, it's just a matter of when. But we need to let the market develop and it would be in our best interest to see BA go daily year round before scoring a second year round TATL flight.

Here's a nifty little tool with 2015 census estimates for those who love messing around with populations and demographics: https://sedac.ciesin.columbia.edu/mappi ... st/gpw-v4/

I would argue the catchment areas for BNA is actually larger in terms of population than AUS (although the given population in AUS likely has more impact per capita). AUS has significant airports on 3 of 4 sides (SAT, DFW, IAH) and a vast area of nothingness on the fourth side that really eats into its catchment area. Using the map above for reference, AUS's catchment area is somewhere in the neighborhood of 2.7 million people and BNA's is ~3.3 million. For AUS I excluded Waco and San Antonio, and for BNA I excluded Huntsville, Knoxville, and Chattanooga, although all of those areas undoubtedly feed into AUS and BNA to some degree. RDU, on the other hand, has a significantly larger catchment area at somewhere in the range of 4.5 million people by my measurements.

I do wonder about the effects of having BA as the carrier instead of AA or DL. My acquaintances from Nashville have rarely travelled with BA when traveling to Europe. Most are still flying one of the US legacy carriers for whatever reason. Is it lack of knowledge, or do people generally not know that they can transfer to far more places in Europe by connecting through LHR than through ATL, JFK, or ORD? I really think the demand is there from BNA to have daily service to Europe, there may be a lack of knowledge about the service.

"Hey Hey - thanks for the population link. Drawing a 161 KM (100 Miles) circle around various cities yields: CVG 8.5M CMH 7M RDU 6.1M IND 5.8M AUS 5.7M SDF 5.5M STL 4M BNA 3.9M MEM 2.7M

In terms of Annual Passengers: BNA 16M/Focus WN AUS 16M/Focus WN STL 16M/Focus WN RDU 13M/Focus DL IND 9.4M CVG 8M/Focus DL MEM 4.4M SDF 3.8M.

Bluegrass60 wrote:

"Hey Hey - thanks for the population link. Drawing a 161 KM (100 Miles) circle around various cities yields: CVG 8.5M CMH 7M RDU 6.1M IND 5.8M AUS 5.7M SDF 5.5M STL 4M BNA 3.9M MEM 2.7M

In terms of Annual Passengers: BNA 16M/Focus WN AUS 16M/Focus WN STL 16M/Focus WN RDU 13M/Focus DL IND 9.4M CVG 8M/Focus DL MEM 4.4M SDF 3.8M.

You really can't just draw a circle around cities of a standard size. People don't behave that way and you get overlapping "catchment areas". For example, putting a 100 mile circle around LEX would give a catchment area of 5.4 million people. Putting that same radius around SDF would include Cincinnati in the SDF catchment area as well as Bowling Green, although SDF isn't pulling anyone from inside Cincinnati and Bowling Green is entirely within BNA's catchment area. Going to the Northeast would indicate that PHL has a catchment area of 30 million people since it includes all of NYC, although clearly no one from NYC is commuting to PHL for their flight.

In other cases simply drawing a radius around cities ignores decent sized areas that do fall into an airports catchment area. For example Paducah/Western KY is outside of the 100 mile radius of any major airport but feeds into both STL and BNA (probably 20% STL, 75% BNA, an 5% PAH based on my experiences living there).

I really think you have to draw lines based on where the majority of the population chooses to go. Most of the time that creates some really crazy looking catchment areas.

LOL. The further out you go the more variables. There are many overlapping catchment areas. The NEAST Corridor probably the most overlap. 100 miles or less...seems to me to be the distance from an airport that might make sense to look at alternatives. The point is depending on where someone lives...their budget, their time, airline schedules, airline equipment, loyalty programs, how easy to get to the alternative airport, whether flight is direct or connecting, ultimate destination, parking rates etc there could be more than one option for air travel. Contrary to what you note...SDF does get CVG catchment and vice versa....same applies to BNA, IND, LEX, OWB and EVV...the degree to which they attract each others catchment is based on aforementioned factors.

HeyHey wrote:

Fargo wrote:

That is because RDU was within the range of a 752, and it was pretty successful actually. It is now on a 763 and is daily or near daily year round (I believe it may be 5x week or so in the very slow winter months). But we have to remember RDU has had TATL service since 1994 and is a bit bigger and further economically developed than BNA. As for AUS, I'd argue they are on a completely different level than BNA/RDU. The MSA proper may be around the same size, but they serve a much larger catchment area (closer to 3-5 million people depending on how you look at it), they have a bigger business community and advanced tech sector and it is the state capital of the 10th largest economy in the world. It's no wonder BA is flying daily 744's/77W's and LH (a conservative airline when it comes to non-hub routes in the US) just started service there, with DL to CDG and a TPAC flight likely around the corner.

None of this is to say BNA isn't significant in it's own right, we (I live in the Nashville area FYI) are growing rapidly as well. We'll get more European service eventually, it's just a matter of when. But we need to let the market develop and it would be in our best interest to see BA go daily year round before scoring a second year round TATL flight.

Here's a nifty little tool with 2015 census estimates for those who love messing around with populations and demographics: https://sedac.ciesin.columbia.edu/mappi ... st/gpw-v4/

I would argue the catchment areas for BNA is actually larger in terms of population than AUS (although the given population in AUS likely has more impact per capita). AUS has significant airports on 3 of 4 sides (SAT, DFW, IAH) and a vast area of nothingness on the fourth side that really eats into its catchment area. Using the map above for reference, AUS's catchment area is somewhere in the neighborhood of 2.7 million people and BNA's is ~3.3 million. For AUS I excluded Waco and San Antonio, and for BNA I excluded Huntsville, Knoxville, and Chattanooga, although all of those areas undoubtedly feed into AUS and BNA to some degree. RDU, on the other hand, has a significantly larger catchment area at somewhere in the range of 4.5 million people by my measurements.

I do wonder about the effects of having BA as the carrier instead of AA or DL. My acquaintances from Nashville have rarely travelled with BA when traveling to Europe. Most are still flying one of the US legacy carriers for whatever reason. Is it lack of knowledge, or do people generally not know that they can transfer to far more places in Europe by connecting through LHR than through ATL, JFK, or ORD? I really think the demand is there from BNA to have daily service to Europe, there may be a lack of knowledge about the service.

For me the BA (BNA-LHR) flight has been a game changer for getting to London.. That being said as a DL platinum Medallion even 1 TATL flight is a lot of MQM's to give up to fly BA. I am currently in Italy and our routing was (BNA-JFK-CDG-FLR). 14.5 hours if we were to do BNA-LHR-FLR we would have to transfer to LCY (an awful transfer) to get into Florence and it would take at least the same amount of time and a car transfer in London. I know there are other connections where LHR may make sense such as Athens and other business destinations but I have also found LHR is not the best place to connect.

Or you could do BNA-LHR-PSA and drive an hour on the back end through some beautiful countryside

Here is an article from TPG posted a few weeks ago about the expanded Sky Club. Mostly speculative, but interesting nonetheless.

https://thepointsguy.com/news/delta-massively-expanding-nashville-sky-club-in-2020/

Fargo wrote:

Here is an article from TPG posted a few weeks ago about the expanded Sky Club. Mostly speculative, but interesting nonetheless.

https://thepointsguy.com/news/delta-massively-expanding-nashville-sky-club-in-2020/

Interesting they mentioned a potential TATL flight. Speculative for sure, but it seems to be getting some traction.

EvanWSFO wrote:

Fargo wrote:

Here is an article from TPG posted a few weeks ago about the expanded Sky Club. Mostly speculative, but interesting nonetheless.

https://thepointsguy.com/news/delta-massively-expanding-nashville-sky-club-in-2020/

Interesting they mentioned a potential TATL flight. Speculative for sure, but it seems to be getting some traction.

I can’t imagine any other reason to have a SC that big....the current setup is very small, sure, but to make it one of the largest in the system (hub/FC or not) without corresponding increase in routes or frequency???

dafunk10 wrote:

EvanWSFO wrote:

Fargo wrote:

Here is an article from TPG posted a few weeks ago about the expanded Sky Club. Mostly speculative, but interesting nonetheless.

https://thepointsguy.com/news/delta-massively-expanding-nashville-sky-club-in-2020/

Interesting they mentioned a potential TATL flight. Speculative for sure, but it seems to be getting some traction.

I can’t imagine any other reason to have a SC that big....the current setup is very small, sure, but to make it one of the largest in the system (hub/FC or not) without corresponding increase in routes or frequency???

BNA is one of DL’s largest outstations and the current club is drastically undersized. Other than a TATL flight and some upgauging, I can’t see many more additions, especially with their gate situation.

dafunk10 wrote:

EvanWSFO wrote:

Fargo wrote:

Here is an article from TPG posted a few weeks ago about the expanded Sky Club. Mostly speculative, but interesting nonetheless.

https://thepointsguy.com/news/delta-massively-expanding-nashville-sky-club-in-2020/

Interesting they mentioned a potential TATL flight. Speculative for sure, but it seems to be getting some traction.

I can’t imagine any other reason to have a SC that big....the current setup is very small, sure, but to make it one of the largest in the system (hub/FC or not) without corresponding increase in routes or frequency???

This is still minimal investment compared to what would be needed to stop a full blown Southwest 200 flights a day hub. This might be a very profitable dl station now but once Southwest build it up to something the size of las or den or bwi, it will be a whole different situation.

Frankly, dl has shown minimal interest in building up cities they already do well in, but are obsessed with building up places where they are weak at.

tphuang wrote:

This is still minimal investment compared to what would be needed to stop a full blown Southwest 200 flights a day hub. This might be a very profitable dl station now but once Southwest build it up to something the size of las or den or bwi, it will be a whole different situation.

Frankly, dl has shown minimal interest in building up cities they already do well in, but are obsessed with building up places where they are weak at.

DL doesn’t need to build up p2p flying here. It wouldn’t make sense for them to do so. Other than TATL service, I think what BNA sees now is what they’ll get in the future.

I don’t think they have no interest in their strong stations, it’s just they are already good enough so they don’t need to build them anymore. They build up their weak stations to address network gaps (with the exception of BOS, it still baffles me why they are sinking so much $$$ there).

tphuang wrote:

dafunk10 wrote:

EvanWSFO wrote:

Interesting they mentioned a potential TATL flight. Speculative for sure, but it seems to be getting some traction.

I can’t imagine any other reason to have a SC that big....the current setup is very small, sure, but to make it one of the largest in the system (hub/FC or not) without corresponding increase in routes or frequency???

This is still minimal investment compared to what would be needed to stop a full blown Southwest 200 flights a day hub. This might be a very profitable dl station now but once Southwest build it up to something the size of las or den or bwi, it will be a whole different situation.

Frankly, dl has shown minimal interest in building up cities they already do well in, but are obsessed with building up places where they are weak at.

Judging from how they approach their Medallion members (and as a DM myself), I don’t think they’re trying to compete for the WN flier....they’re clearly differentiating themselves to (1) FFs that value a premium experience and (2) business travelers that value consistent, on time departures.

I have colleagues who are high volume AA and WN flyers (UA isn’t useful and not a preferred airline for my company given their weakness in the SE)....even they admit that DL’s product out of BNA is much more reliable than those 2, and that matters much more than being $50-$150 more expensive when you’re flying on the company’s dime (that said, I’m flying to LAS with a layover in ATL that is $350 cheaper than a WN direct in the next few weeks, so DL seems to be picking their spots cost-wise).

In no way is DL going to stop WN’s ascent at BNA, but there’s a huge opportunity with the business community that AA for whatever reason doesn’t seem interested in taking advantage of that DLs is aggressively courting

Fargo wrote:

tphuang wrote:

This is still minimal investment compared to what would be needed to stop a full blown Southwest 200 flights a day hub. This might be a very profitable dl station now but once Southwest build it up to something the size of las or den or bwi, it will be a whole different situation.

Frankly, dl has shown minimal interest in building up cities they already do well in, but are obsessed with building up places where they are weak at.

DL doesn’t need to build up p2p flying here. It wouldn’t make sense for them to do so. Other than TATL service, I think what BNA sees now is what they’ll get in the future.

I don’t think they have no interest in their strong stations, it’s just they are already good enough so they don’t need to build them anymore. They build up their weak stations to address network gaps (with the exception of BOS, it still baffles me why they are sinking so much $$$ there).

Exactly....domestically I could see them adding AUS, and maybe seasonal service to RSW and/or one the the Miami area airports, but nothing more than increased frequency to their hubs outside of that

dafunk10 wrote:

I have colleagues who are high volume AA and WN flyers (UA isn’t useful and not a preferred airline for my company given their weakness in the SE)....even they admit that DL’s product out of BNA is much more reliable than those 2, and that matters much more than being $50-$150 more expensive when you’re flying on the company’s dime (that said, I’m flying to LAS with a layover in ATL that is $350 cheaper than a WN direct in the next few weeks, so DL seems to be picking their spots cost-wise).

In no way is DL going to stop WN’s ascent at BNA, but there’s a huge opportunity with the business community that AA for whatever reason doesn’t seem interested in taking advantage of that DLs is aggressively courting

DL has an opportunity to become the legacy of choice, though the fact that DL has hubs in smaller/less important markets makes it hard for some business travelers to give up on AA or UA. DL still has far, far too many network holes in important business markets (Chicago, Dallas, San Francisco, D.C., etc.) to gain most rational business travelers’ exclusive loyalty ex-BNA.

Cubsrule wrote:

dafunk10 wrote:

I have colleagues who are high volume AA and WN flyers (UA isn’t useful and not a preferred airline for my company given their weakness in the SE)....even they admit that DL’s product out of BNA is much more reliable than those 2, and that matters much more than being $50-$150 more expensive when you’re flying on the company’s dime (that said, I’m flying to LAS with a layover in ATL that is $350 cheaper than a WN direct in the next few weeks, so DL seems to be picking their spots cost-wise).

In no way is DL going to stop WN’s ascent at BNA, but there’s a huge opportunity with the business community that AA for whatever reason doesn’t seem interested in taking advantage of that DLs is aggressively courting

DL has an opportunity to become the legacy of choice, though the fact that DL has hubs in smaller/less important markets makes it hard for some business travelers to give up on AA or UA. DL still has far, far too many network holes in important business markets (Chicago, Dallas, San Francisco, D.C., etc.) to gain most rational business travelers’ exclusive loyalty ex-BNA.

DL is sort of already the legacy of choice at BNA, (I think?) they are the second largest carrier after WN. But you are correct in they have big holes in the markets you mentioned, especially Texas.

AA does have an advantage (no pun intended) in one sense that it has TATL service operated by it's jv partner. DL will have to jump on CDG or AMS (preferably the former) sooner or later if they want to become the legacy of choice.

I could maaaaybe even see VS here at some point as well, but that's a long way off at this point.

DL is capturing a huge amount of the premium Intl Pax out of BNA these days. I was coming home from FLR on Saturday and on my CDG-DTW leg the purser told me 35 pax connected on to DTW-BNA. This may have been an anomaly but 14 of the 16 pax with us in F on the DTW-BNA leg (A320) came off our flight in the biz cabin from AF 378 (CDG-DTW) I was told that some of the pax ended up in Y+ on the leg due to the lack of space in F on the last leg.

gsg013 wrote:

DL is capturing a huge amount of the premium Intl Pax out of BNA these days. I was coming home from FLR on Saturday and on my CDG-DTW leg the purser told me 35 pax connected on to DTW-BNA. This may have been an anomaly but 14 of the 16 pax with us in F on the DTW-BNA leg (A320) came off our flight in the biz cabin from AF 378 (CDG-DTW) I was told that some of the pax ended up in Y+ on the leg due to the lack of space in F on the last leg.

Are they loyal DL flyers? Did you ask why they didn’t take the BA flight?

I don't think my point was really clear enough. It seems pretty apparent that dl is currently the legacy of choice in Nashville and has very strong point of sale there. That's why it's such a strong station for them.

The problem they will get into is if Southwest brings this to a 200 flight station. That's the trajectory I see. Then, there will be direct service to a lot of these places that people are currently connecting at Atlanta or detroit. And it will also be a competing airline for north to Florida traffic. All of which will hurt Delta and aa. Delta more since it currently own a stronger point of sale. So delta can certainly choose to be comfortable in it's position and it hasn't shown willingness to change that, but status quo isn't going to last much longer.

From what I can see, wn has picked up the pace of expansion at Nashville. It really has no alternative in that region. And unlike the other station where it is planning a lot of expansion, Denver, it doesn't have to deal with a legacy building things up.

tphuang wrote:

I don't think my point was really clear enough. It seems pretty apparent that dl is currently the legacy of choice in Nashville and has very strong point of sale there. That's why it's such a strong station for them.

The problem they will get into is if Southwest brings this to a 200 flight station. That's the trajectory I see. Then, there will be direct service to a lot of these places that people are currently connecting at Atlanta or detroit. And it will also be a competing airline for north to Florida traffic. All of which will hurt Delta and aa. Delta more since it currently own a stronger point of sale. So delta can certainly choose to be comfortable in it's position and it hasn't shown willingness to change that, but status quo isn't going to last much longer.

From what I can see, wn has picked up the pace of expansion at Nashville. It really has no alternative in that region. And unlike the other station where it is planning a lot of expansion, Denver, it doesn't have to deal with a legacy building things up.

It's going to be a while before WN gets to 200 flights at BNA. They'll need more gates, and while they are to take all of the new D, they may have to temporarily give up some gates on C while the new international arrivals facility is built as that will displace six gates. So it may not be until the mid-to-late 2020's before we see WN get to that level.

The one advantage DL has is they have a premium cabin and lounges, while WN does not. DL also has the ability to launch TATL service, while WN does not. With the amount of money in the Nashville, particularly in Williamson County (one of the richest counties in the entire United States), business travelers may gravitate towards DL because the overall product is better suited for them, even if it means taking a 50 minute short hop to ATL to connect.

If DL expands their lounge, launches TATL and maybe even brings in VS down the road, they'd be hands down my top choice for sure.

Fargo wrote:

The one advantage DL has is they have a premium cabin and lounges, while WN does not. DL also has the ability to launch TATL service, while WN does not. With the amount of money in the Nashville, particularly in Williamson County (one of the richest counties in the entire United States), business travelers may gravitate towards DL because the overall product is better suited for them, even if it means taking a 50 minute short hop to ATL to connect.

It's not **just** a 50-minute hop to ATL. It's a 50-minute flight to ATL, a connection of an hour or two, and in many cases a longer flight from ATL than from BNA because ATL is out of the way. Time is money for business travelers, and if WN has a nonstop at a sensible time, the vast, vast majority of business travelers will take that. Take a look at the boarding area for a WN flight to DAL or OAK or MKE some time. You'll see plenty of ties and even more khakis and button downs.

southwest1675 wrote:

Cubsrule wrote:

Fargo wrote:

The one advantage DL has is they have a premium cabin and lounges, while WN does not. DL also has the ability to launch TATL service, while WN does not. With the amount of money in the Nashville, particularly in Williamson County (one of the richest counties in the entire United States), business travelers may gravitate towards DL because the overall product is better suited for them, even if it means taking a 50 minute short hop to ATL to connect.

It's not **just** a 50-minute hop to ATL. It's a 50-minute flight to ATL, a connection of an hour or two, and in many cases a longer flight from ATL than from BNA because ATL is out of the way. Time is money for business travelers, and if WN has a nonstop at a sensible time, the vast, vast majority of business travelers will take that. Take a look at the boarding area for a WN flight to DAL or OAK or MKE some time. You'll see plenty of ties and even more khakis and button downs.

I agree with this. I think people tend to forget that yes, business travelers do fly WN. People want nonstops. Southwest will be close to 200 daily flights sooner than you think.

I agree too, I was mostly just disputing the point tphaung made that WN is going to make things tough for DL in the future. My point was DL has (or will have soon) some significant advantages over WN that will keep business flyers, but WN has some significant advantages as well. Both will do fine here.

If anyone needs to be worried, it’s AA/UA, who are becoming less attractive by the day. I really don’t understand what they are trying to do here.

Fargo wrote:

If anyone needs to be worried, it’s AA/UA, who are becoming less attractive by the day. I really don’t understand what they are trying to do here.

AA does better than UA in this department, I don't understand why people chose to fly UA unless you live(or travel frequently) in Chicago, San Fran, Houston, Jersey, and I guess Washington DC if you travel a lot internationally.

Midwestindy wrote:

Fargo wrote:

If anyone needs to be worried, it’s AA/UA, who are becoming less attractive by the day. I really don’t understand what they are trying to do here.

AA does better than UA in this department, I don't understand why people chose to fly UA unless you live(or travel frequently) in Chicago, San Fran, Houston, Jersey, and I guess Washington DC if you travel a lot internationally.

Yes, UA is often in 4th place at most small to medium sized airports and flies a ton of 50 seaters. At BNA in particular, they fly a ton of RJ’s when they should be flying mainline (ORD, IAH and DEN come to mind) and they don’t even have a club here. Even AA is regressing a bit, they use to have all mainline on BNA-DFW and now they throw a CR7 on the route in the evening.

Meanwhile, DL is going all mainline expect for NYC, BOS and RDU.....

I just flew the overnight SY from LAX to BNA last night. There were 22 seats empty on the flight.

I also agree with people who say service to MEX and GDL is needed. There are a handful of companies in the Nashville area that have plants/DC's in Mexico. I know co-workers that fly to MEX, GDL, MTY on a weekly basis.

Midwestindy wrote:

Fargo wrote:

If anyone needs to be worried, it’s AA/UA, who are becoming less attractive by the day. I really don’t understand what they are trying to do here.

AA does better than UA in this department, I don't understand why people chose to fly UA unless you live(or travel frequently) in Chicago, San Fran, Houston, Jersey, and I guess Washington DC if you travel a lot internationally.

Who said UA is trying to be the #1 airline for BNA-based travelers? It's simply an outstation for them, one they're allowing their SFO, ORD, EWR, etc.-based passengers to get to. For the record, UA offers mainline service to ORD, which AA does not do on a regular basis; mainline service to EWR, which neither DL nor AA do to LGA or JFK; and recently upgauged mainline service to IAD, which AA does not offer to DCA, so BNA must not be a total dog for them. Furthermore, they have the strength of their broad international network. Several of my co-workers who travel internationally for business have UA as their preferred carrier here in BNA because Europe, Asia, and Latin America are all just a one-stop flight away.

I'm tired of people on this web site taking their personal preferences and trying to pass them off as fact. Just because YOU don't like UA (or AA or whatever carrier) or UA isn't the best option for YOUR personal travel habits doesn't mean it isn't a more attractive option for other people.

Fargo wrote:

Yes, UA is often in 4th place at most small to medium sized airports and flies a ton of 50 seaters. At BNA in particular, they fly a ton of RJ’s when they should be flying mainline (ORD, IAH and DEN come to mind) and they don’t even have a club here. Even AA is regressing a bit, they use to have all mainline on BNA-DFW and now they throw a CR7 on the route in the evening.

Meanwhile, DL is going all mainline expect for NYC, BOS and RDU.....

You were typing your response while I was typing my response, but this is exactly what I am talking about. You criticize UA for not offering all mainline service to ORD, IAH, and DEN (though all routes see at least 1 mainline a day, at least with the summer schedule), but I can't believe DL doesn't offer ANY mainline service to such big markets as NYC and BOS. I refuse to sit in a regional jet for 3 hours BOS-BNA, so I fly B6 or WN on the route instead.

Also, it has been explained on here that the nighttime CRJ-700 BNA-DFW flight is for crew and aircraft rotation purposes; it's not because AA can't support a mainline flight load wise.

UALFAson wrote:

Fargo wrote:

Yes, UA is often in 4th place at most small to medium sized airports and flies a ton of 50 seaters. At BNA in particular, they fly a ton of RJ’s when they should be flying mainline (ORD, IAH and DEN come to mind) and they don’t even have a club here. Even AA is regressing a bit, they use to have all mainline on BNA-DFW and now they throw a CR7 on the route in the evening.

Meanwhile, DL is going all mainline expect for NYC, BOS and RDU.....

You were typing your response while I was typing my response, but this is exactly what I am talking about. You criticize UA for not offering all mainline service to ORD, IAH, and DEN (though all routes see at least 1 mainline a day, at least with the summer schedule), but I can't believe DL doesn't offer ANY mainline service to such big markets as NYC and BOS. I refuse to sit in a regional jet for 3 hours BOS-BNA, so I fly B6 or WN on the route instead.

Also, it has been explained on here that the nighttime CRJ-700 BNA-DFW flight is for crew and aircraft rotation purposes; it's not because AA can't support a mainline flight load wise.

The mainline to their hubs is spotty at best. They only fly 1x daily mainline to their so-called hometown “flagship” hub of ORD, and they still are flying 50 seaters on that route! I mean, come on.
DEN is almost never mainline and IAH is similar to ORD.

Sorry, but the cold hard fact is UA is usually behind DL, AA and WN at these medium hub airports and their product is simply non-competitive. They have an unhealthy obsession with RJ’s and it is going to cost them long term. They can have the best international network all they want, but as long as they are the weakest of the major US airlines domestically, it doesn’t mean jack. Midwestindy was spot on when he said UA, for most people, doesn’t make sense to fly unless you live in one of their gun markets.

And I say all of this as somebody who used to fly exclusively UA.

To the point about the CR7 on BNA-DFW, it certainly is odd that this repositioning issue all of a sudden came up at a time when traffic at BNA and on that route is increasing dramatically. And it’s not like the time that the CR7 flies on isn’t prime time or anything.

I doubt DL is terribly worried that BNA "might" become a 200 flight station for WN (I suspect if they get to 150 that will be sufficient). Unless I am missing a city, they already overlap each other on all of DL's destination except SLC. DL may have an opportunity to add a couple more high yield domestic stations, but they take care of their pax. As previously mentioned, mainline to LGA would be nice. The A220 seems the obvious choice but I'd take a 717. Either way, the size of the club they are building seems to indicate they know something a lot here suspect but have yet to reveal.

Fargo wrote:

Yes, UA is often in 4th place at most small to medium sized airports and flies a ton of 50 seaters. At BNA in particular, they fly a ton of RJ’s the point about the CR7 on BNA-DFW, it certainly is odd that this repositioning issue all of a sudden came up at a time when traffic at BNA and on that route is increasing dramatically. And it’s not like the time that the CR7 flies on isn’t prime time or anything.

To the contrary, it makes perfect sense. The OO maintenance operation hasn't shrunk any, but upgauging has resulted in many fewer OO flights at BNA (across all three majors) than there were five years ago. They have to move the aircraft through maintenance somehow. That's why you notice the positioning flights now.

EvanWSFO wrote:

I doubt DL is terribly worried that BNA "might" become a 200 flight station for WN (I suspect if they get to 150 that will be sufficient). Unless I am missing a city, they already overlap each other on all of DL's destination except SLC. DL may have an opportunity to add a couple more high yield domestic stations, but they take care of their pax. As previously mentioned, mainline to LGA would be nice. The A220 seems the obvious choice but I'd take a 717. Either way, the size of the club they are building seems to indicate they know something a lot here suspect but have yet to reveal.

If DL was not worried about it, it would not do some of the things I have read about on this thread:
- making noise about all the mainline service to BNA
- making noise about TATL flight
- new sky club

The reality is that the larger WN gets at BNA, it will become more favored among Nashville ff and corporate community. Which in turn will leave DL battling AA to keep itself as legacy of choice, but that pie will shrink over time if it doesn't do anything about WN expansion. WN has clearly now made the decision to pick BNA over ATL or any other stations in Southeast. There have been enough cases of WN build up to see how they quickly they can expand. Unlike STL or MCI, there are no alternatives to BNA.

Remember, strong presence in stations like BNA and IND makes ATL and DTW really profitable. That's the one thing DL does really well and UA under Kirby has been looking to build up, competitive service attracting higher yielding flyers in non-hub cities.

EvanWSFO wrote:

I doubt DL is terribly worried that BNA "might" become a 200 flight station for WN (I suspect if they get to 150 that will be sufficient). Unless I am missing a city, they already overlap each other on all of DL's destination except SLC. DL may have an opportunity to add a couple more high yield domestic stations, but they take care of their pax. As previously mentioned, mainline to LGA would be nice. The A220 seems the obvious choice but I'd take a 717. Either way, the size of the club they are building seems to indicate they know something a lot here suspect but have yet to reveal.

I don't think DL can go all mainline from BNA like they can at AUS, I think they will always need to cycle some RJ's into BOS, NYC, and RDU because of the Skywest base at BNA.
------------------------------
Your username is pretty direct in showing which airline you prefer

UALFAson wrote:

Who said UA is trying to be the #1 airline for BNA-based travelers? It's simply an outstation for them, one they're allowing their SFO, ORD, EWR, etc.-based passengers to get to. For the record, UA offers mainline service to ORD, which AA does not do on a regular basis; mainline service to EWR, which neither DL nor AA do to LGA or JFK; and recently upgauged mainline service to IAD, which AA does not offer to DCA, so BNA must not be a total dog for them. Furthermore, they have the strength of their broad international network. Several of my co-workers who travel internationally for business have UA as their preferred carrier here in BNA because Europe, Asia, and Latin America are all just a one-stop flight away.

I'm tired of people on this web site taking their personal preferences and trying to pass them off as fact. Just because YOU don't like UA (or AA or whatever carrier) or UA isn't the best option for YOUR personal travel habits doesn't mean it isn't a more attractive option for other people.

A few points I would like to break down about this:
1. BNA-IAD is not competitive with BNA-DCA despite it having mainline, 3x daily service doesn't compete with 6x daily flights

2. AA BNA-ORD is regularly serviced with mainline, it was only dropped for the summer due to Max issues. If you look at tomorrow's schedule there is mainline, and mainline returns 2x daily in September when the Max's are scheduled to come back.

3. I'll give you that UA has a better schedule than AA/DL from BNA to SFO, IAH, and DEN(maybe EWR but that's more of a stretch). But that's just it.
The largest markets from BNA are in this order (2018, Q3):
NYC (Served fairly equally by AA, DL, and UA)
BOS (DL)
WAS (AA/UA)
LA (AA/DL)
CHI (AA/UA)
DFW (AA, requires slight backtrack on DL and UA)
MIA (AA, requires slight backtrack on UA)
DEN (UA)
PHL (AA, requires slight backtrack on DL and UA)
MCO (DL sat only)(UA requires backtrack)

Out of the top 10 largest destinations from BNA, AA serves 7 of them.

In terms of destinations UA and DL are close, but outside of the top 10 DL has an advantage with service to CUN, SEA, SLC, DTW, ATL, RDU, and MSP plus a Skyclub. Compared to IAH and SFO for UA, in addition to having no skyclub.

You can bring up that UA has a great int'l network, but AA/BA has a TATL flight from BNA, making most important destinations in EMEA 1 stop from BNA.

Fargo wrote:

Midwestindy wrote:

Fargo wrote:

If anyone needs to be worried, it’s AA/UA, who are becoming less attractive by the day. I really don’t understand what they are trying to do here.

AA does better than UA in this department, I don't understand why people chose to fly UA unless you live(or travel frequently) in Chicago, San Fran, Houston, Jersey, and I guess Washington DC if you travel a lot internationally.

Yes, UA is often in 4th place at most small to medium sized airports and flies a ton of 50 seaters. At BNA in particular, they fly a ton of RJ’s when they should be flying mainline (ORD, IAH and DEN come to mind) and they don’t even have a club here. Even AA is regressing a bit, they use to have all mainline on BNA-DFW and now they throw a CR7 on the route in the evening.

Meanwhile, DL is going all mainline expect for NYC, BOS and RDU.....

I've been flying IAH-BNA lately. I am a UA FF. To say UA is a disappointment on this route would be accurate. My experience has been mostly CRJ-200's and E145's. If I'm lucky, I get an E175. I've been late more than I've been on time due to maintenance and crew scheduling issues. There was an instance when my flight back home was in a maintenance delay, and I was able to get on a flight connecting in ORD..on a 738. The times for the flights between IAH and BNA have gotten worse, as well. UA removed the 6:25 pm flight back to IAH for June, while the IAH-BNA flights were changed to 2:30 pm and 9:45 pm.

I have two more trips scheduled in June. Both involve flying AA through DFW. AA flies mainline on both legs of that itinerary, coming and going. I know DFW serves a different purpose for AA than IAH does for UA, but what a difference!

tphuang wrote:

EvanWSFO wrote:

I doubt DL is terribly worried that BNA "might" become a 200 flight station for WN (I suspect if they get to 150 that will be sufficient). Unless I am missing a city, they already overlap each other on all of DL's destination except SLC. DL may have an opportunity to add a couple more high yield domestic stations, but they take care of their pax. As previously mentioned, mainline to LGA would be nice. The A220 seems the obvious choice but I'd take a 717. Either way, the size of the club they are building seems to indicate they know something a lot here suspect but have yet to reveal.

If DL was not worried about it, it would not do some of the things I have read about on this thread:
- making noise about all the mainline service to BNA
- making noise about TATL flight
- new sky club

The reality is that the larger WN gets at BNA, it will become more favored among Nashville ff and corporate community. Which in turn will leave DL battling AA to keep itself as legacy of choice, but that pie will shrink over time if it doesn't do anything about WN expansion. WN has clearly now made the decision to pick BNA over ATL or any other stations in Southeast. There have been enough cases of WN build up to see how they quickly they can expand. Unlike STL or MCI, there are no alternatives to BNA.

Remember, strong presence in stations like BNA and IND makes ATL and DTW really profitable. That's the one thing DL does really well and UA under Kirby has been looking to build up, competitive service attracting higher yielding flyers in non-hub cities.

We will just have to disagree, and I patronize both both carriers. Yes, it's obvious WN is replacing ATL as a connecting point, but there are still enough destinations they don't serve that will give DL opportunities. What Delta is doing is giving it's loyal pax incentive to stay with them. It wasn't that long ago they had no service to the west coast. The growth is likely a part of the overall strength of the airport itself. If anyone is losing in this, I suspect it is AA.

flyingfromiah wrote:

Fargo wrote:

Midwestindy wrote:

AA does better than UA in this department, I don't understand why people chose to fly UA unless you live(or travel frequently) in Chicago, San Fran, Houston, Jersey, and I guess Washington DC if you travel a lot internationally.

Yes, UA is often in 4th place at most small to medium sized airports and flies a ton of 50 seaters. At BNA in particular, they fly a ton of RJ’s when they should be flying mainline (ORD, IAH and DEN come to mind) and they don’t even have a club here. Even AA is regressing a bit, they use to have all mainline on BNA-DFW and now they throw a CR7 on the route in the evening.

Meanwhile, DL is going all mainline expect for NYC, BOS and RDU.....

I've been flying IAH-BNA lately. I am a UA FF. To say UA is a disappointment on this route would be accurate. My experience has been mostly CRJ-200's and E145's. If I'm lucky, I get an E175. I've been late more than I've been on time due to maintenance and crew scheduling issues. There was an instance when my flight back home was in a maintenance delay, and I was able to get on a flight connecting in ORD..on a 738. The times for the flights between IAH and BNA have gotten worse, as well. UA removed the 6:25 pm flight back to IAH for June, while the IAH-BNA flights were changed to 2:30 pm and 9:45 pm.

I have two more trips scheduled in June. Both involve flying AA through DFW. AA flies mainline on both legs of that itinerary, coming and going. I know DFW serves a different purpose for AA than IAH does for UA, but what a difference!

IAH does serve a different purpose, but even the core connecting hubs of ORD and DEN see tons of RJs. UA has got to get more mainline and upgauge their core hubs if they want to be more competitive. At BNA, upgauging and putting a club in would go a long way.

Midwestindy wrote:

You can bring up that UA has a great int'l network, but AA/BA has a TATL flight from BNA, making most important destinations in EMEA 1 stop from BNA.

I might add to this that AA/BA and DL/AF/KL are far ahead of UA/LH in serving non-hub secondary cities, thus giving them an advantage to Europe IMO.

I don't have time to research, but does anyone have current numbers of pax at BNA by airline? We all know WN is first, not sure who is in second nowadays.

Fargo wrote:

flyingfromiah wrote:

Fargo wrote:

Yes, UA is often in 4th place at most small to medium sized airports and flies a ton of 50 seaters. At BNA in particular, they fly a ton of RJ’s when they should be flying mainline (ORD, IAH and DEN come to mind) and they don’t even have a club here. Even AA is regressing a bit, they use to have all mainline on BNA-DFW and now they throw a CR7 on the route in the evening.

Meanwhile, DL is going all mainline expect for NYC, BOS and RDU.....

I've been flying IAH-BNA lately. I am a UA FF. To say UA is a disappointment on this route would be accurate. My experience has been mostly CRJ-200's and E145's. If I'm lucky, I get an E175. I've been late more than I've been on time due to maintenance and crew scheduling issues. There was an instance when my flight back home was in a maintenance delay, and I was able to get on a flight connecting in ORD..on a 738. The times for the flights between IAH and BNA have gotten worse, as well. UA removed the 6:25 pm flight back to IAH for June, while the IAH-BNA flights were changed to 2:30 pm and 9:45 pm.

I have two more trips scheduled in June. Both involve flying AA through DFW. AA flies mainline on both legs of that itinerary, coming and going. I know DFW serves a different purpose for AA than IAH does for UA, but what a difference!

IAH does serve a different purpose, but even the core connecting hubs of ORD and DEN see tons of RJs. UA has got to get more mainline and upgauge their core hubs if they want to be more competitive. At BNA, upgauging and putting a club in would go a long way.

BNA-IAH sees 4x daily mainline in November
BNA-ORD 3x mainline, DEN 2x mainline, IAD 2x mainline, SFO 2x mainline, EWR 5x mainline
For UA that's pretty good service, assuming it sticks, being that far in advance.

SumChristianus wrote:

Fargo wrote:

flyingfromiah wrote:

I've been flying IAH-BNA lately. I am a UA FF. To say UA is a disappointment on this route would be accurate. My experience has been mostly CRJ-200's and E145's. If I'm lucky, I get an E175. I've been late more than I've been on time due to maintenance and crew scheduling issues. There was an instance when my flight back home was in a maintenance delay, and I was able to get on a flight connecting in ORD..on a 738. The times for the flights between IAH and BNA have gotten worse, as well. UA removed the 6:25 pm flight back to IAH for June, while the IAH-BNA flights were changed to 2:30 pm and 9:45 pm.

I have two more trips scheduled in June. Both involve flying AA through DFW. AA flies mainline on both legs of that itinerary, coming and going. I know DFW serves a different purpose for AA than IAH does for UA, but what a difference!

IAH does serve a different purpose, but even the core connecting hubs of ORD and DEN see tons of RJs. UA has got to get more mainline and upgauge their core hubs if they want to be more competitive. At BNA, upgauging and putting a club in would go a long way.

BNA-IAH sees 4x daily mainline in November
BNA-ORD 3x mainline, DEN 2x mainline, IAD 2x mainline, SFO 2x mainline, EWR 5x mainline
For UA that's pretty good service, assuming it sticks, being that far in advance.

That's most likely a filler schedule. BNA-ORD usually see's 1x mainline and DEN has been mostly all E75 for some time now.

Fargo wrote:

SumChristianus wrote:

Fargo wrote:

IAH does serve a different purpose, but even the core connecting hubs of ORD and DEN see tons of RJs. UA has got to get more mainline and upgauge their core hubs if they want to be more competitive. At BNA, upgauging and putting a club in would go a long way.

BNA-IAH sees 4x daily mainline in November
BNA-ORD 3x mainline, DEN 2x mainline, IAD 2x mainline, SFO 2x mainline, EWR 5x mainline
For UA that's pretty good service, assuming it sticks, being that far in advance.

That's most likely a filler schedule. BNA-ORD usually see's 1x mainline and DEN has been mostly all E75 for some time now.

Granted that I transferred out 2 and a half years ago and left the industry this time last year, but as I recall from working the UA contract in BNA, the number of mainline on ORD and IAH varies by season while EWR has steadily increased and IAD was added after I left BNA. DEN was daily mainline year-round at one point and may be currently E75 for fleet allocation reasons.

UA is still somewhat in a hole domestically due to pmUA's complete LACK of narrowbodies and huge reliance on RJs to fill in. That's not unique to BNA. Also, UA was the last of the big four airlines to have upper management (and middle management) wake up and realize that BNA isn't some backwater nowhere station anymore.

They're playing catch up, but they can't add at BNA without more new planes or taking from somewhere else, so it's slow. It really wasn't that long ago that UA operated 21 E145s, 2 CR2s, and MAYBE 1 or 2 E170s a day to BNA. Pretty much exactly 4 years, in fact.

antoniemey wrote:

Fargo wrote:

SumChristianus wrote:

BNA-IAH sees 4x daily mainline in November
BNA-ORD 3x mainline, DEN 2x mainline, IAD 2x mainline, SFO 2x mainline, EWR 5x mainline
For UA that's pretty good service, assuming it sticks, being that far in advance.

That's most likely a filler schedule. BNA-ORD usually see's 1x mainline and DEN has been mostly all E75 for some time now.

Granted that I transferred out 2 and a half years ago and left the industry this time last year, but as I recall from working the UA contract in BNA, the number of mainline on ORD and IAH varies by season while EWR has steadily increased and IAD was added after I left BNA. DEN was daily mainline year-round at one point and may be currently E75 for fleet allocation reasons.

UA is still somewhat in a hole domestically due to pmUA's complete LACK of narrowbodies and huge reliance on RJs to fill in. That's not unique to BNA. Also, UA was the last of the big four airlines to have upper management (and middle management) wake up and realize that BNA isn't some backwater nowhere station anymore.

They're playing catch up, but they can't add at BNA without more new planes or taking from somewhere else, so it's slow. It really wasn't that long ago that UA operated 21 E145s, 2 CR2s, and MAYBE 1 or 2 E170s a day to BNA. Pretty much exactly 4 years, in fact.

Yes, I remember quite well when UA at BNA was mostly CR2’s and E145’s. They’ve come a long way, but they still have more to do. Not only is more upgauging needed, but they’ll need to put a United Club at here at some point, which unfortunately I don’t think will happen until A is reconstructed/expanded.

You are right, UA needs lots more narrowbodies so they can upgauge across their network, but Mr Kirby is stubbornly holding that up for some reason in hopes that he can get the pilots union to agree to mainline E75’s

Fargo wrote:

gsg013 wrote:

DL is capturing a huge amount of the premium Intl Pax out of BNA these days. I was coming home from FLR on Saturday and on my CDG-DTW leg the purser told me 35 pax connected on to DTW-BNA. This may have been an anomaly but 14 of the 16 pax with us in F on the DTW-BNA leg (A320) came off our flight in the biz cabin from AF 378 (CDG-DTW) I was told that some of the pax ended up in Y+ on the leg due to the lack of space in F on the last leg.

Are they loyal DL flyers? Did you ask why they didn’t take the BA flight?

Anecdotally my wife and I are loyal DL flyers (Platinum and Gold) a couple that was sitting behind us had platinum and diamond bag tags. I saw a few others with the bag tags with platinum. We didnt ask others about the BA flight. Personally we didn't take the BA flight for 2 reasons the connection to FLR on BA from London is from LCY not LHR. The other reason is to get the 16k MQM and 50,000 miles we earned on the trip. (We don't fly AA so those points wouldn't have been worth much to us)

gsg013 wrote:

Fargo wrote:

gsg013 wrote:

DL is capturing a huge amount of the premium Intl Pax out of BNA these days. I was coming home from FLR on Saturday and on my CDG-DTW leg the purser told me 35 pax connected on to DTW-BNA. This may have been an anomaly but 14 of the 16 pax with us in F on the DTW-BNA leg (A320) came off our flight in the biz cabin from AF 378 (CDG-DTW) I was told that some of the pax ended up in Y+ on the leg due to the lack of space in F on the last leg.

Are they loyal DL flyers? Did you ask why they didn’t take the BA flight?

Anecdotally my wife and I are loyal DL flyers (Platinum and Gold) a couple that was sitting behind us had platinum and diamond bag tags. I saw a few others with the bag tags with platinum. We didnt ask others about the BA flight. Personally we didn't take the BA flight for 2 reasons the connection to FLR on BA from London is from LCY not LHR. The other reason is to get the 16k MQM and 50,000 miles we earned on the trip. (We don't fly AA so those points wouldn't have been worth much to us)

So if DL were to add TATL, would you prefer CDG or AMS?

Interesting article about BNA today on anna.aero: https://www.anna.aero/2019/05/31/nashville-airport-records-eighth-year-of-consecutive-growth-in-2018-reaches-just-under-16-million-last-year-southwest-continues-to-dominate-market-share/

Jumpstart conference is next week in Nashville, as a result they have a sizable piece on BNA with some interesting info:
http://cdn1.pps-publications.com/anna-a ... index.html

"From an international standpoint, our current interests include Asia, specifically Tokyo, as well as additional destinations in Europe, such as cities in France and Germany"

"For domestic targets, we are focused on more services to the west coast where we see growing demand, including Sacramento and Orange County, as well as increased service to Portland, San Diego, and Phoenix. We hear Hawaii has nice beaches as well, hints Powell."

Midwestindy wrote:

Jumpstart conference is next week in Nashville, as a result they have a sizable piece on BNA with some interesting info:
http://cdn1.pps-publications.com/anna-a ... index.html

"From an international standpoint, our current interests include Asia, specifically Tokyo, as well as additional destinations in Europe, such as cities in France and Germany"

"For domestic targets, we are focused on more services to the west coast where we see growing demand, including Sacramento and Orange County, as well as increased service to Portland, San Diego, and Phoenix. We hear Hawaii has nice beaches as well, hints Powell."

I don’t take too much stock in these kind of statements, but here is my analysis

1. DL to CDG or AMS I now feel is inevitable, but it won’t be launched until the Sky Club is expanded. After that, I have trouble seeing where else in Europe BNA could get nonstops too. Maybe VS if enough demand ever arises for a second LON flight. I’d love to see LH to FRA, but the small UA presence here and a lack of a Club hinders that effort IMO.

2. TYO, it will be interesting to see what happens, but the lack of a 10,000 ft+ n/s runway may be a hinderance in the short term. Once they lengthen 2L/20R to 12,000 ft, then that becomes more likely. However, BNA also has to compete with the likes of IND, RDU, AUS, etc.

3. Domestically, once the MAX issues are past and things get back to normal, WN will likely add the CA cities mentioned if they are serious about making BNA a megastation like some on here claim. Believe it or not, I do believe AA will jump on BNA-PHX eventually if they really want more PHX service.

4. Hawaii ain’t happening anytime soon unless HA starts an aggressive expansion into mid-sized markets east of the Rocky Mountains, not sure why that was brought up.

southwest1675 wrote:

Nice to see AA is back as the #2 carrier at BNA.

I think they always were, it’s just DL has more mainline and when measuring by purely mainline, DL is larger than AA.