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The signage looks fine to me for a daily/less than daily flight. It’s BIG. You can’t miss it. And, that is the point. Let’s not get overly pedantic.

Southwest employees are standing by the gate watching and waiting for it to come on.

ARFF getting ready for the water cannon salute

STLflyer wrote:

Few random pics. Check in was a bit of a cluster but that’s to be expected.

https://imgur.com/a/lHhWLMF

I’ll leave the lounge and make my way over to the gate for some pics when the inbound gets closer.

Thanks for the pictures. I can not believe how bush league everything looks for such an important moment in STL airport's history.

The check in desks looks as if it's a temporary airline coming in. Even if they don't proper signage for the back wall, they could of updated the desk with monitors that displayed the airline, and flight info (like other airports do). At least it looks like LH stanchion dressings.

STLflyer wrote:

Southwest employees are standing by the gate watching and waiting for it to come on.

ARFF getting ready for the water cannon salute

That’s intriguing maybe just because I big deal for the airport.

TVNWZ wrote:

The signage looks fine to me for a daily/less than daily flight. It’s BIG. You can’t miss it. And, that is the point. Let’s not get overly pedantic.

Overly pedantic? Off to look that up! LOL. Anyway for a big deal for the airport and this city you would think they would have thrown a little extra effort into signage, etc. No, you can't miss it but you COULD do better. Kind of goes hand-in-hand with the poor marketing they do. At least they have the fire truck for the water cannon.

Landed!! Saw all you spotters. Very fun design of Stl on the plane. FAs are wearing heels and hats like the 70s

Willkommen!

https://imgur.com/a/lN1UYUr

Water cannon salute video
https://twitter.com/i/status/1532077377672691712

Anyone know what the last regularly scheduled pax widebody service to STL was? I'm going to guess HNL or LGW back in 2003 before AA took the first axe swing to the hub?

PhilMcCrackin wrote:

Anyone know what the last regularly scheduled pax widebody service to STL was? I'm going to guess HNL or LGW back in 2003 before AA took the first axe swing to the hub?

I believe Jshank83 posted this earlier today:

https://thepointsguy.com/news/lufthansa ... ct-europe/

So LGW's last flight was 31 October 2003, HNL not sure..

BHMNONREV wrote:

PhilMcCrackin wrote:

Anyone know what the last regularly scheduled pax widebody service to STL was? I'm going to guess HNL or LGW back in 2003 before AA took the first axe swing to the hub?

I believe Jshank83 posted this earlier today:

https://thepointsguy.com/news/lufthansa ... ct-europe/

So LGW's last flight was 31 October 2003, HNL not sure..

I missed that, thanks.

IIRC, HNL was being served on the 767 until some time in the 2003 timeframe and it died around or before AA made the first big cuts in 11/2003. Whether it lived longer than LGW, I don't know.

TWA302 wrote:

STLflyer wrote:

Few random pics. Check in was a bit of a cluster but that’s to be expected.

https://imgur.com/a/lHhWLMF

I’ll leave the lounge and make my way over to the gate for some pics when the inbound gets closer.

Thanks. How hard is it to throw a LH logo into this monitor? Wow...

It ended up getting fixed. I took a pic of it fixed. I’ll post some pics later tonight

PhilMcCrackin wrote:

BHMNONREV wrote:

PhilMcCrackin wrote:

Anyone know what the last regularly scheduled pax widebody service to STL was? I'm going to guess HNL or LGW back in 2003 before AA took the first axe swing to the hub?

I believe Jshank83 posted this earlier today:

https://thepointsguy.com/news/lufthansa ... ct-europe/

So LGW's last flight was 31 October 2003, HNL not sure..

I missed that, thanks.

IIRC, HNL was being served on the 767 until some time in the 2003 timeframe and it died around or before AA made the first big cuts in 11/2003. Whether it lived longer than LGW, I don't know.

Post here talks about it. STL-OGG had been cancelled but HNL was still operating in July '03. One can guess it didn't last through the end of the year.
https://www.airliners.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=201933

Technically speaking, the Eastern Airlines flights to the Caribbean or Mexico/Costa Rica on apple were 767s, although those were “scheduled charters”

Seems we’re going to be delayed about an hour, cutting my connection in FRA down to a butt clenching one hour.

STLflyer wrote:

Seems we’re going to be delayed about an hour, cutting my connection in FRA down to a butt clenching one hour.

If you are staying within Schengen you should be OK, otherwise bring some good running shoes..

STLflyer wrote:

Seems we’re going to be delayed about an hour, cutting my connection in FRA down to a butt clenching one hour.

They have an express connection line once in fra with a digital e-board with permitted flights that lets you skip the lines

Long overdue TATL service for STL! I wouldn't be shocked to see it go 5x weekly soon.

April numbers for STL are out

Passengers
Up 54% vs April 2021
Down 16.2% vs April 2019

Up 74.3% YTD vs 2021
Down 21.2% YTD vs 2019

https://www.flystl.com/uploads/document ... -April.pdf

STLflyer wrote:

Seems we’re going to be delayed about an hour, cutting my connection in FRA down to a butt clenching one hour.

They might be able to pick up some time on the way over.

Congrats to STL, long time coming

TWA302 wrote:

PhilMcCrackin wrote:

BHMNONREV wrote:

I believe Jshank83 posted this earlier today:

https://thepointsguy.com/news/lufthansa ... ct-europe/

So LGW's last flight was 31 October 2003, HNL not sure..

I missed that, thanks.

IIRC, HNL was being served on the 767 until some time in the 2003 timeframe and it died around or before AA made the first big cuts in 11/2003. Whether it lived longer than LGW, I don't know.

Post here talks about it. STL-OGG had been cancelled but HNL was still operating in July '03. One can guess it didn't last through the end of the year.
https://www.airliners.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=201933

In 2003 I flew STL-LAX Thanksgiving weekend on the evening flight and it was a AA 762 which come in from London.

BHMNONREV wrote:

PhilMcCrackin wrote:

Anyone know what the last regularly scheduled pax widebody service to STL was? I'm going to guess HNL or LGW back in 2003 before AA took the first axe swing to the hub?

I believe Jshank83 posted this earlier today:

https://thepointsguy.com/news/lufthansa ... ct-europe/

So LGW's last flight was 31 October 2003, HNL not sure..

HNL looks to be the same date from what I can find.

https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/america ... ess-9.html

Here's an interesting thread from FlyerTalk. Looks like the date was 11/1/2003 and HNL and LGW were slashed at the same time.

PhilMcCrackin wrote:

https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/american-airlines-aadvantage-pre-consolidation-usair/159912-effective-nov-1-stl-become-smaller-hub-but-hub-nonetheless-9.html

Here's an interesting thread from FlyerTalk. Looks like the date was 11/1/2003 and HNL and LGW were slashed at the same time.

Good find!

Here is the list from the long thread.
STL SCHEDULE

EFFECTIVE NOVEMBER 1, 2003

AMERICAN AIRLINES, AMERICAN EAGLE AND AMERICAN CONNECTION

AMERICAN AIRLINES NONSTOP JET AND RJ SERVICE:

Destination Frequency (Jet/RJ)

Baltimore/Washington 2
Boston 2/2
Chicago 12
Dallas/Fort Worth 13
Fort Lauderdale 1
Fort Myers 1
Las Vegas 2
Los Angeles 3
Miami 2
New Orleans 1/1
New York LaGuardia 3/3
Orange County 1
Orlando 2
Phoenix 1
San Diego 1
San Francisco 2
Seattle 2
Tampa 2
Cancun (weekends) 1
San Juan (weekends) 1

TOTAL 55/6

AMERICAN CONNECTION NONSTOP RJ AND TURBOPROP SERVICE:

Destination Frequency (RJ/Turboprop)

Atlanta 5
Austin 1
Charlotte 2
Colorado Springs 1
Columbus 3
Dayton 3
Denver 4
Des Moines 3
Hartford 1
Jacksonville, FL 1
Nashville 3/1
Newark 5
Northwest Arkansas 4
Milwaukee 4
Minneapolis/St. Paul 5
Norfolk 2
Philadelphia 5
Pittsburgh 2
Raleigh/Durham 5
Richmond 1
San Antonio 4
Washington (D.C.) Dulles 4
Washington (D.C.) Reagan 7
Wichita 4

TOTAL 79/1

AMERICAN CONNECTION NONSTOP TURBOPROP SERVICE:

Destination Frequency

Bloomington, IL 3
Burlington, IA 3
Cape Girardeau, MO 3
Cedar Rapids, IA 3
Champaign, IL 2
Cincinnati, OH 3
Columbia, MO 2
Decatur, IL 3
Evansville, IN 2
Fort Leonard Wood, MO 3
Indianapolis, IN 3
Jackson, TN 2
Joplin, MO 2
Kirksville, MO 2
Lafayette, IN 2
Madison, WI 1
Marion, IN 4
Memphis, TN 5
Owensboro, KY 3
Paducah, KY 3
Peoria, IL 3
Quincy, IL 4
Springfield, IL 3
Springfield, MO 4

TOTAL 68

CANCELED SAINT LOUIS NON-STOP ROUTES

AMERICAN AIRLINES NONSTOP JET SERVICE:

Albuquerque
Honolulu
Oklahoma City
Salt Lake City
Anchorage
New York JFK
Portland
Sacramento
Cleveland
London Gatwick
Louisville
Tulsa
Detroit
Little Rock
San Jose, CA
Vancouver
Kansas City


AMERICAN AIRLINES NONSTOP JET AND RJ SERVICE:

Omaha

AMERICAN CONNECTION NONSTOP RJ SERVICE:

Sioux Falls
Houston Intercontinental
Lincoln
Shreveport
Toronto


AMERICAN CONNECTION NONSTOP RJ AND TURBOPROP SERVICE:

Moline

AMERICAN CONNECTION NONSTOP TURBOPROP SERVICE:

Fort Smith
Fort Wayne
South Bend

Yes, I kept some of the schedules from AA.com (when you could print them out) around the late 2003/2004/2005 period. They're buried somewhere in boxes at the moment but off the top of my head, as I can remember-

Oct 31, 2003 vs. Nov 1., 2003 was a brutal mess, for sure, but there were some increases in service not too far down the road after that.

OHare and DFW soon became a shuttle service.
LGA would get up to 6 daily, LAX to 5 - there would be boosts to SFO, SEA, SAN, MCO, TPA, a mix of RJs to SAT, BWI, BOS, and some others - and I think TUL even had S80 on it at one point --- did New Orleans?
The 757 was frequent to DFW, MIA, I think one of the LAX frequencies was a 757 - and the two LAS roundtrips were a 757 which was pretty much dedicated to the route - it'd start in Vegas at 6am, come to STL for a midday- do a turn - come back and do a Vegas turn around 8 at night.

RJ services would increase to IAD, DSM, IND, AUS, OKC, TUL, BDL, PHL CLT, and BNA.

While the RJ hub was a far cry from the past - and it really sucked to look out at the empty D gates - at the height - the mainline jets used the even gates and went down to C28. RJs were scheduled up to C27 pulling in C29, as needed for overflow - so it was nice to see "most" of C still having some life to it.

stlgph wrote:

The 757 was frequent to DFW, MIA, I think one of the LAX frequencies was a 757 - and the two LAS roundtrips were a 757 which was pretty much dedicated to the route - it'd start in Vegas at 6am, come to STL for a midday- do a turn - come back and do a Vegas turn around 8 at night.

The 757s were nice. Used to get those on ORD frequently and they were usually the ex-TWA ones which were much nicer than the native AA ones. Until 2008 or 2009, whenever it was they cut them loose and most went to Delta.

Somewhat topical, LH's first 787-9 is kicking around in the new livery. Set to be delivered this summer. We might see it in STL at some point.

PhilMcCrackin wrote:

stlgph wrote:

The 757 was frequent to DFW, MIA, I think one of the LAX frequencies was a 757 - and the two LAS roundtrips were a 757 which was pretty much dedicated to the route - it'd start in Vegas at 6am, come to STL for a midday- do a turn - come back and do a Vegas turn around 8 at night.

The 757s were nice. Used to get those on ORD frequently and they were usually the ex-TWA ones which were much nicer than the native AA ones. Until 2008 or 2009, whenever it was they cut them loose and most went to Delta.

Somewhat topical, LH's first 787-9 is kicking around in the new livery. Set to be delivered this summer. We might see it in STL at some point.

Id really love to see a A340 subbed in even if for a flight here and there. One layout has almost the same seats count as the A330. Only 4 less economy seats.

Jshank83 wrote:

PhilMcCrackin wrote:

stlgph wrote:

The 757 was frequent to DFW, MIA, I think one of the LAX frequencies was a 757 - and the two LAS roundtrips were a 757 which was pretty much dedicated to the route - it'd start in Vegas at 6am, come to STL for a midday- do a turn - come back and do a Vegas turn around 8 at night.

The 757s were nice. Used to get those on ORD frequently and they were usually the ex-TWA ones which were much nicer than the native AA ones. Until 2008 or 2009, whenever it was they cut them loose and most went to Delta.

Somewhat topical, LH's first 787-9 is kicking around in the new livery. Set to be delivered this summer. We might see it in STL at some point.

Id really love to see a A340 subbed in even if for a flight here and there. One layout has almost the same seats count as the A330. Only 4 less economy seats.

I don't think that would be far fetched for the occasional one-off, or even more so down the road if the cargo commitment on both ends picks up

A couple more notes from yesterday just based on some discussion.

It sounds like STL might have a similar setup to IND-CDG did on incentives, where the more passengers fly the more money LH gets. I need to look more into it. They for sure aren't getting full funds from one of the 2.5 million pots until they get to 5 weekly flights. I would hope that pushes them to get to 5 quicker if booking continue to be strong.

Without getting into specific airlines/routes, the A321XLR is probably going to be a big deal for us adding more international destinations, assuming the LH flight does well demand wise. I know some people think its a long flight for a narrow body, but it is better than no flight in my opinion. Hopefully doing well on that at first could lead to bigger planes later.

It sounds like the delay in the flight leaving was due to the workers still learning on the job, I assume that will get better.

___
At one point I was standing near the check in desk and a lady with two dogs came up to me and asked if I knew where check in for dogs was and where she could get a cart for her carrier, apparently they have a designated area for them at ORD. She said they usually fly out of there, so that was nice to hear people that usually go to Chicago are now flying out of here.

I saw other passengers with LH tags/tape on their bags already so they must be regular LH flyers.

It also was nice to see a much more diverse array of travelers checking in for the flight than you would see on WN, no offense to WN. Much more different languages and backgrounds than I am used to seeing at the check in counter here.

I will be interested to see how much this flight props up our Europe numbers and maybe cuts down on leakage to Chicago/self connectors elsewhere.

It'll be interesting to see if this affects Air Canada at all.

stlgph wrote:

It'll be interesting to see if this affects Air Canada at all.

On one hand it could help... people need to do one leg of their trip on a day LH doesn't fly.
On the other it could take from people who were using them on W/F/Su.

Seems promising though that they are ramping up flights pretty quickly and upgrading planes.

Seems as though Air Canada and Lufthansa have more faith in their STL Star Alliance flyers than United

stlgph wrote:

Seems as though Air Canada and Lufthansa have more faith in their STL Star Alliance flyers than United

I am dreading my trip to BZE on UA next month. Haven't flown them since 12/08 when we flew to SGN on OZ/UA.

stlgph wrote:

Yes, I kept some of the schedules from AA.com (when you could print them out) around the late 2003/2004/2005 period. They're buried somewhere in boxes at the moment but off the top of my head, as I can remember-

Oct 31, 2003 vs. Nov 1., 2003 was a brutal mess, for sure, but there were some increases in service not too far down the road after that.

OHare and DFW soon became a shuttle service.
LGA would get up to 6 daily, LAX to 5 - there would be boosts to SFO, SEA, SAN, MCO, TPA, a mix of RJs to SAT, BWI, BOS, and some others - and I think TUL even had S80 on it at one point --- did New Orleans?
The 757 was frequent to DFW, MIA, I think one of the LAX frequencies was a 757 - and the two LAS roundtrips were a 757 which was pretty much dedicated to the route - it'd start in Vegas at 6am, come to STL for a midday- do a turn - come back and do a Vegas turn around 8 at night.

RJ services would increase to IAD, DSM, IND, AUS, OKC, TUL, BDL, PHL CLT, and BNA.

While the RJ hub was a far cry from the past - and it really sucked to look out at the empty D gates - at the height - the mainline jets used the even gates and went down to C28. RJs were scheduled up to C27 pulling in C29, as needed for overflow - so it was nice to see "most" of C still having some life to it.

It was acknowledged even by Gerard Arpey that the cut down hub did well for AA until the 2008 recession. Although it ultimatley would have went the way of the smaller hubs (CLE, MEM, CVG, etc.) for a variety of reasons, it was never a drag on their system (like it was before the pull down, reportedly).I think AA's old CRO suggested they could have built it up like CLT I'm not convinced there's the local traffic for that given STL's close proximilty to ORD / DTW / MSP etc

Glad to hear that by all accounts the LH flight has been an initial success. The business class bookings are certainly great to hear. I wonder if what we'll eventually see is a 5x 787 flight.

And as far as other TATL flights, we haven't had one for 20 years......lets start with one and go from there.

I think, at times, the smaller STL AA hub was larger than what Continental had flying out of Cleveland, especially in the 2007+ era.

Part of the success for AA's bottom line with STL was they were able to utilize and concentrate on older aircraft - i.e. the use of older 757 and the older TWA MD fleet. At the same time, the STL hub was heavily reliant upon Chautauqua and Trans States - I think they did 55-60% of the flying - and they just couldn't weather the storm of 2008 with the 50 seaters.

stlgph wrote:

I think, at times, the smaller STL AA hub was larger than what Continental had flying out of Cleveland, especially in the 2007+ era.

Part of the success for AA's bottom line with STL was they were able to utilize and concentrate on older aircraft - i.e. the use of older 757 and the older TWA MD fleet. At the same time, the STL hub was heavily reliant upon Chautauqua and Trans States - I think they did 55-60% of the flying - and they just couldn't weather the storm of 2008 with the 50 seaters.

IIRC, most of the remaining former TW pilots were fenced in at STL, so it made a lot of sense to keep the hub going. They still had a fair bit of flying up until 2009 or so when they finally officially dehubbed STL and got rid of the remaining non-hub routes.

Jshank83 wrote:

A couple more notes from yesterday just based on some discussion.

It sounds like STL might have a similar setup to IND-CDG did on incentives, where the more passengers fly the more money LH gets. I need to look more into it. They for sure aren't getting full funds from one of the 2.5 million pots until they get to 5 weekly flights. I would hope that pushes them to get to 5 quicker if booking continue to be strong.

Without getting into specific airlines/routes, the A321XLR is probably going to be a big deal for us adding more international destinations, assuming the LH flight does well demand wise. I know some people think its a long flight for a narrow body, but it is better than no flight in my opinion. Hopefully doing well on that at first could lead to bigger planes later.

It sounds like the delay in the flight leaving was due to the workers still learning on the job, I assume that will get better.

___
At one point I was standing near the check in desk and a lady with two dogs came up to me and asked if I knew where check in for dogs was and where she could get a cart for her carrier, apparently they have a designated area for them at ORD. She said they usually fly out of there, so that was nice to hear people that usually go to Chicago are now flying out of here.

I saw other passengers with LH tags/tape on their bags already so they must be regular LH flyers.

It also was nice to see a much more diverse array of travelers checking in for the flight than you would see on WN, no offense to WN. Much more different languages and backgrounds than I am used to seeing at the check in counter here.

I will be interested to see how much this flight props up our Europe numbers and maybe cuts down on leakage to Chicago/self connectors elsewhere.

I noticed in the gate area a lot of people had red passports (EU). Heard a lot of accents too. Overheard the guy behind me in J telling his seat mate that he was originally from Poland and going back to visit.

I think this flight will do very well with the Bosnians in STL as it cuts out an extra stop.

The outbound took an even longer delay today despite the inbound being on time. Guess they’re still getting the bugs worked out.

Looks like the flight back to FRA arrived early and was almost 1.25 hours late leaving. Anyone have a clue why?

STLflyer wrote:

Jshank83 wrote:

A couple more notes from yesterday just based on some discussion.

It sounds like STL might have a similar setup to IND-CDG did on incentives, where the more passengers fly the more money LH gets. I need to look more into it. They for sure aren't getting full funds from one of the 2.5 million pots until they get to 5 weekly flights. I would hope that pushes them to get to 5 quicker if booking continue to be strong.

Without getting into specific airlines/routes, the A321XLR is probably going to be a big deal for us adding more international destinations, assuming the LH flight does well demand wise. I know some people think its a long flight for a narrow body, but it is better than no flight in my opinion. Hopefully doing well on that at first could lead to bigger planes later.

It sounds like the delay in the flight leaving was due to the workers still learning on the job, I assume that will get better.

___
At one point I was standing near the check in desk and a lady with two dogs came up to me and asked if I knew where check in for dogs was and where she could get a cart for her carrier, apparently they have a designated area for them at ORD. She said they usually fly out of there, so that was nice to hear people that usually go to Chicago are now flying out of here.

I saw other passengers with LH tags/tape on their bags already so they must be regular LH flyers.

It also was nice to see a much more diverse array of travelers checking in for the flight than you would see on WN, no offense to WN. Much more different languages and backgrounds than I am used to seeing at the check in counter here.

I will be interested to see how much this flight props up our Europe numbers and maybe cuts down on leakage to Chicago/self connectors elsewhere.

I noticed in the gate area a lot of people had red passports (EU). Heard a lot of accents too. Overheard the guy behind me in J telling his seat mate that he was originally from Poland and going back to visit.

I think this flight will do very well with the Bosnians in STL as it cuts out an extra stop.

The outbound took an even longer delay today despite the inbound being on time. Guess they’re still getting the bugs worked out.

My flight was about 80% German, followed by Africans, Indians, and Arabs connecting to visit family, and then American (most of who were av/travel geeks). Many of the Germans said it was their first trip to the US and chose this flight because it was nonstop and they had some random connection to STL like a college friend or work colleague they wanted to see on their summer trip to the US before going onward. I don't think these people would have been to STL had it not been for the flight.

I was very impressed with how well the flight fit in with the arrival bank from the middle east/India, and as noted above, it is obviously proving convenient for our international families.

TWA302 wrote:

Looks like the flight back to FRA arrived early and was almost 1.25 hours late leaving. Anyone have a clue why?

The TPG article said the delay was because the catering and janitorial folks weren't used to working on such a large aircraft and there was a learning curve. It's a rather tight turn as it is, anyway, there's not a lot of slack there.

TWA302 wrote:

Looks like the flight back to FRA arrived early and was almost 1.25 hours late leaving. Anyone have a clue why?

First one was about that late because the ground crews are still learning on the job. Guessing this one was the same thing.

Got a behind the scenes tour of the new expansion at BLV today.

On track to be done in December. Should clear the way for a base to come in the next couple years, if the get the small community grant that would move up the timeline.

Will have 4 jetbridges and 2 ground loading gates.
Security will have 3 security lanes.
Current security area will change to exit only.
New terminal will have a lactation suite, pet relief area, concessions area, bathrooms, more offices.
Concession will have a window on land side so you can get a drink/food while you wait for someone.
Has a storm shelter that will hold either 700 or 900 people.
Feds paid for almost off of this. Local gov paid less than a million total on it.

Boeing is set to be done in 2024, they have to build a new taxiway with a bridge that should be done next year. I might be one year off on these dates, I can't remember.


Qatar Air Force C-17


T-5 trainer







Outside of new extension is about done


New behind the scenes baggage area


New security screening area


New passenger waiting area


New passenger waiting area


Boeing expansion for unmanned tanker


Boeing


Boeing


Flight tracker near baggage claim


Inside original terminal


Baggage


Check in

How does blv always find a way to get someone else to pay for it? There always seems to be some random handout they get from the feds

A ways off still but in November Air Canada drops back down to 2 daily, after a short ramp up to 3 in October.

BUT it will be a CRJ-900 for both flights starting in November. So more seats even with less flights

So current schedule
thru June it’s 2x CRJ200
July and August 1xE175 and 1xCRJ200
September 2xCRJ200
October 3xCRJ200
Nov thru end of schedule 2xCRJ900

Guessing we might see September and October changed still if the others hold.

“Oh no, they’re not flying CRJ-200s” said no one ever.

Spirit did a schedule extension into early Jan from mid November
MCO/LAS/PHX/FLL/RSW are on it.
No LAX which I find shocking
No TPA/CUN either.