One of the large problems faced is that management may choose(probably will choose) not to operate the RJ's at the mainline even if scope is recaptured. So with a lot of regional lifers about to hit the streets in such a scenario, once again the merger situation gets dicey. No way ALPA will touch this situation, neither will any other union, DPA included.

A large part of the reason scope relief was originally given was to fund ailing pension plans at the mainline carriers. For example, at one point 9E stock was mostly funding mainline employee's DB plans. The scam was to take huge stock awards on companies with guaranteed profits and then dump the loses on the share holders when the well ran dry.(i.e. Mesa)

We have seen with comair and the other regionals such as compass that wall street has figured this out and has balked at any type of future regional IPO. So we have a situation where management can no longer achieve any benefits from further scope relief, as well, most of the pension funding obligations are gone, which means that we are likely to see larger aircraft replace RJ flying at mainline.