Originally Posted by
FLYBOYMATTHEW
For March, 84% of the DFW trips are 4-days. There are very, very few that are commutable on both ends. The majority of pairings there have always started early and ended late. A "good" commutable 4-day starts after 10 am, and ends by 5 pm, and is worth around 20ish hours, which means as a line holder, PBS will assign 4 per month. You wod have mixed rests dropping specific pairings. Right now, as mentioned, it's fairly easy. I've also had difficulty some months unloading commutable 4-day weekday trips. The commuting options to anywhere out of Lubbock seem rather limited, is it realistic and sustainable to live there and commute to any major hub, especially to reserve? I mean, you do still have to allow 2 flight options to be protected by the commuter clause.
I know reserve will be a complete nightmare out of Lubbock, no matter what the base. As for the other bases, DFW would still be preferable because it's just one leg, several flights a day, I have family and friends there, etc. However, I think other bases, particularly Vegas (since they have the red-eyes that start late) might still work ok, because my plan would be (once I hold a line) to try and get three 4-day rotations per month at about 60-65 hours. Even if one end isn't commutable, that basically means I have three 5-day rotations (including the three travel days) and still have 15 days off. It's not ideal, but it's sort of a happy medium between getting reasonable days off and reasonable (although reduced) pay.