Scope won't allow for 90 new airframes unless they cut more from another carrier. Envoy will likely get more airplanes, but they will be from another carrier.

At this time scope would alow for ~30-35 more large rjs.

If American exercises any of the 90 options they own they must come to envoy.

It is possible pdt could get planes from republic, but they just signed updated capacity purchase agreements with all 3 major cariers, and they own there own planes.

I live in DFW. Would commuting to Piedmont for better schedules and faster upgrade make more sense?

If you're older in class you could get the E175 and be DFW based from the start. If not wait the 6-9 months it'll take to transfer to DFW on the E145. Drive to work, especially if the alternative is an east coast commute possibly to an outstation that doesn't even have direct flights.

I personally wouldn't commute to a WO regional when you live in the base of another one. Get in line for the flow and apply everywhere else. PDTs flow isn't that much better than envoys (approx 4-5 years vs 6-8 years) to legitimize a commute and QOL hit for that long.

I'm 33, so probably have a decent shot at the 175 for envoy. How realistic is their 2.5 year upgrade protection?

Depends how much you value a faster flow and immediate upgrade compared to how much you value not having a commute. Some guys don't mind that commute, and would rather take the faster upgrade. Other people want to be home as much as possible and will sacrifice the upgrade time and flow time. Totally depends on your mentality, but I wouldn't say you're going wrong choosing either.

Keep in mind that at PDT your base will be PHL, not an outstation as some have suggested. All the jets are based in Philly

With 50+ new hires per month materializing and topside attrition continuing the upgrade time is realistic.

Not sure about your current circumstances but if you have zero 121 time it'll take you close to two years anyway to get the required time to upgrade

I only have roughly 200 hours of time that counts towards the PIC requirements, so 800 hours. I should be able to get that in a year and a half, right?

It seems like there's a lot of 4/2 schedules at Envoy, so quality of life seems about the same.

So Piedmont's flow is faster than Envoy's??