Probably not because even though UAL was willing to negotiate a new price, the cost of running the Qs on a seperate certificate under the new contract created enormous training costs and training events that made the operation marginal. The Qs came in under the old Continental scope, and until UAL had new joint scope they could not be on the same certificate as the CRJ 900s. Any way you look at it the Q operation was a financial disaster, and Delta very rightly refused to invest money in an operation that had no prayer of being financially viable.

 

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Nope just spent my time in hell at PCL while that mess was going on.

 

Delta allowed Comair to RFP to string the Comair pilots along on hope and faith. Delta never intended for a wholly owned Comair to get flying for other legacy airlines. Comair pilots had a history of "just sign this or accept this, and gasp, new RFPs and new planes!"

FFDs in the regional industry is a dying model. The mainline is going to expose the regional to more costs than before. The regionals are no longer what they were meant to be, a cheap labor force that had constant movement. Now everyone at the regionals is basically topped out, 8-12+ year CAs and lots of 6+ year FOs. Long run, this high labor cost and FFD model is not sustainable. Delta is taking the first step at fixing it and the most proactive of the legacies. 5 years from now, regionals will start to disappear and many regional flights will be done by the 717 at Delta. The regionals will also not be able to get ATP rated pilots for only 23 grand a year. The only way to attract an already short pool of regional applicants is to offer more pay, and it will come to a breaking point where a regional just can't do it at a lower cost than a major. There will be more industry consolidation in the next 5 years, but the regionals will shrink in pilot numbers over that time.

 

Six pages and only a couple of posts that have anything to do with the original topic.

APC has become just one big wild west show. No Sheriffs in town from the looks of it. Otherwise the hammer would have come down a long time ago in this thread. It is the same couple of posters who keep drifting it.

 

Sorry, what did you want to hear? More regional aircraft and less mainline jobs? Because that is what's happening when AA buys E175/190s for regional airlines.

 

At least now you admit you were wrong and DL management allowed a wholly owned subsidary to bid on flying outside of Delta. But you go off the reservation again when you claim that somehow, if United has awarded Comair flying that Delta was going to change their mind. Geez Shy do you know ridiculous this sounds?



Shy you're crazy. Regionals would love to go back to the revenue sharing model. They were raking in the cash under this model in the late 90s. FFD was created because mainlines were unhappy with spending all the money on marketing and allowing regionals to piggyback with little expense. The only routes mainline is interested in revenue sharing are EAS routes that have very low load factors. The last 3 major RFP awards (Republic/Eagle, Trans States/United, and Delta/Pinnacle) were all capacity purchase agreements.

We'll see if the pilot shortage pushes more flying up to mainline. I'm not sold on the shortage yet, but the indications are it may be happening.

 

A wholly owned regional will not fly for another legacy airline. If it spins off, then all bets are off. There's hardly any past precedence.

 

And Mesaba flew for USAir while being wholly owned by Delta also.

 

All are good points. But don't rule out PSA getting some aircraft, if those new RJ's are 900's. All of our pilots are already typed on the aircraft, reducing training cost considerably for the pilots we will need to upgrade for the growth. Cost for hiring pilots off the street to replace the first officers that will be upgrading will remain the same. The training department is expanding. By September the downstairs in Dayton will be PSA's and it is set up to have large classes running at the same time. We could have upgrades, new hires, and flight attendant classes being conducted without the claustrophobic felling we have now. Yes we will need to have another sim for the 900 differences but it will probably be cheaper to send the pilots to Montreal for a 2 day sim session than it will be to buy one. Yes MZ did pass away but surprisingly KH is showing his face more and has made it clear that he knows PSA must grow with larger aircraft or we are all out of jobs. Last but not least PSA is cheap.