Originally Posted by
Sink r8
I was thinking about your post, and I agree it's not as simple as ignoring those issues. We ARE fighting Boeing very hard on the Exim bank, the end of which they're labeling "armageddon". We ARE fighting Alaska on their own turf.
This is all legitimate, of course. Boeing IS asking our government to use our own money to subsidize competitors, and Alaska made their bed this way. But maybe it doesn't play too well with part of the population. It would be silly not to be cognizant of these issues. Building up Seattle with Airbus products could play poorly. Which is ironic, considering Boeing itself has let Seattle down rather badly with their headquarters move, and assembly line decisions.
End of the day, however, I think the Seattle public will appreciate the competition, and the extra options.
There's that, but also, how much of the traffic going through a hub is Origin/Destination type traffic?
Richard wants to make SEA a hub to Asia, feeding by adding our domestic flight as well as flights from Europe. I wonder what percentage of O/D pax there will be once we get the hub spooled up and get 30 gates.
Narita has very little O/D traffic, yet we still have lots of big iron coming and going through there. Mostly it's connecting traffic. That hub will be shifted to SEA.
I doubt Richard is too worried about what the average citizen in Seattle thinks about Delta's next wide body order, and I doubt they will boycott Delta if we offer international service out of SEA to Asia and Europe on new Airbus' vs. 787's.
Oh, and we already operate a lot of Boeings.