Regional Commuting
 

Long time lurker...

Just wondering who commuts, and to what airline?
If so, could I get an idea of your opinion of commuting to your airline?

Oh boy, can't wait to see where this thread goes.

Everyone is going to have a different opinion. I can speak to commuting as a guy in my early 20s with no wife and kids. I'm commuting to LGA from MSP and so far don't have a huge amounts of complaints. While on reserve I have all of NYC to explore, so its kind of let me live in two cities at once which is neat. The bad side: sometimes you lose a day off at the beginning or end of a trip because you have position yourself the day before, paying for a crashpad, having to pack for up to six days on the road. Now if I have approximately 10% more real commitments (kids etc.) then certain parts of this would be harder. Someone will indefinitely reply shortly saying commuting is about parallel to suicide and you should never do it. It is a matter of perspective and life circumstance.

At Endeavor we just need to give ourselves two options to get us to base before our show time. Call if you miss the first one and crew scheduling will decide if they want to positive space you on the next one. Multiple offenses of missing two result in some kind of mediation board. Never seen that actually happen though.

If you're going to commute, be smart about it. Doing Delta hub-Delta hub commutes is generally an awful idea. MSP-DTW and MSP-ATL are both nightmarish for example.

Commuting sucks. End of story.
Thread dismissed.

For the regionals commuting is highly not recommended. It will literally destroy your life unless you live for nothing else other than the airline. It may be somewhat more worth it at an LCC or major.

If your married and don't want to sell your house or pull your kids out of school find a 1 leg commute with a short rsv time.

If your not married, or don't have kids or a mortgage then move.

Find a commute that will let you:
Commute on your own metal
Commute on your own airline brand
Has 5+ flights a day
Has service to the next closest airport
Is 2 hours or less gate to gate.
Will let you get to the most junior base for upgrading.
Has overnights in your town, so you can go home during a trip.
Is not competitive with other commuters.

You commute on whatever airline gets you home. Everyone's commute is different. And as someone said earlier, commuting sucks.

The problem with answering this question is that everyone's situation is going to be different.

There are too many variables (city pairs, location of base, family situation, etc) to really be able to gauge what your experience will be like based on someone else's.

I had a 1-leg commute from a medium-sized city to my base in a large city. There were enough flights that I never had a problem getting to work or home (although I had many commutes in the night before or commutes home the morning after my reserve period).

My wife and kids were used to me being gone a lot from my time in the military. I used the time sitting reserve to be out exploring the city I was based in and doing recreational activities. I found a convenient crashpad, and the base was close enough to where I lived (300 miles) that I drove my car out and left it at my base.

Although I certainly wouldn't want to do it forever, I tried to enjoy the time I spent on reserve at a regional.

Thanks for the info, Much appreciated!

It sucks. I commute from DEN to MSP for reserve and I cannot wait until I can be based in DEN. There are generally 20 flights a day and reserve forces me to commute in the night before. Sometimes my schedule is five days on, two days off which makes it even more terrible. I try and make the best of it. I explore, I volunteer there, I do whatever I can. But, it still sucks and is extremely hard on the family.

Go get a job at Atlas, Flexjet or any other company that home bases or move to base. End of story.

I will be delaying upgrade by about 3 years in order to never have to commute again. Ever.

Yes, it's that horrible. Commuting to reserve is a special kind of torture. Imagine you've got a 5-day reserve block Mon-Saturday. Well, you've got to commute in on the Sunday before. Then you sit around the crash pad or expensive hotel for 5 days without flying. Just before you head to your commute flight home on Saturday afternoon, Scheduling calls and puts you on a 2-hour turn with 45 minutes block. You then miss your last commute flight home.

You finally return home a week after you left, with 45 minutes of flight time in your logbook to show for it. You then have perhaps 36 hours of time at home before going back out and doing it all over again. Ask me how I know.

There may be some exceptions. For example, I live in SFO, and I could envision commuting to a line in LAX. It's an hour-long flight and there are a zillion opportunities to get to LAX from either SFO, OAK, or SJC. But commuting to reserve? Or commuting halfway across the country? Or two-legging it? Or commuting anywhere during the winter when weather is an issue (i.e. most of the country except FL and CA)? You've just got to be a glutton for punishment.

This is a completely different job when you drive to work. When you drive to work, this is literally the easiest job it's possible to have. Commuting is a whole other ballgame.

Commuting west coast to endless CA reserve in IAH. Makes me question my sanity most days. Having a wife and young children makes it even worse.

Commuting vs living in base is like two different jobs. You'll actually like the job a lot more if you don't have to commute.

Is Chicago a pretty easy place to get based to as a new hire (for any of the regionals based there)? I live near Milwaukee and am hoping to get based at ORD when I have enough hours to move on to the Regionals.

As someone said earlier, it's a tough question to answer because everyone's situation is different and there are so many variables that come into play (your airline, seniority, trip selections, home airport, base airport, number of flights, length of flight, fellow commuters, etc.)
Though the general consensus and obvious answer is avoid commuting if possible, everyone's experience will be different. I for one never have to go a night early or stay a night after my trips. I typically don't have to wait very long for a fight either. This has made my commute fairly simple and somewhat painless.
If you do end up commuting just have in the back of your mind that there is always a chance you won't make it home that night after your trip.

In my personal experience, commuting out west versus the eastern half of the country are two completely different animals. You don't have to deal with things like tropical storms, squall lines, and massive blizzards when commuting out west.

Delaying your advancement in career by three years because of the commute seems silly.

Not if you can advance it in other ways. Commuting to reserve is hell, I will not do it again at a regional.

Maybe at face value but unless you've done it you don't know what you're talking about.

I do the ATL-MSP commute...it really is as much of a nightmare as they say. Sometimes the first flight has a good chunk of seats, sometimes the last flight does too. It's hit or miss. Other days, it's all negative. You see a flight with 20 seats open? You will be number 40 on the list. Jumpseats are always taken.

Now for some better news. SWA is a nice option because all those double brested guys can't bump you out of the jumpseat. I honestly have been doing a two leg commute. Usually going through Madison or Omaha. Those range from 20-100 seats open with maybe a max of 2-6 guys on the list. Yes two legs aren't any fun but at least I can get home. Beats sitting at the airport all day watching the list snowball and ending up number 73 at the end of the day. Just have to get creative is all.

EWR is pretty junior, at RAH. I hear that you can get a line out of training. Or in a few short months. Is PHX-EWR, to reserve as bad a commute as I imagine? Is it still a bad commute, even with a line?

I've done it, and what I accomplished in three years is incredible, so thats why I think it's silly

Envoy is actually only hiring into ORD at the moment. Your options are the E145 or CRJ700. CRJ sounds like a lot of fun, good power/weight ratio etc. They're also offering an additional $5K for legacy airframes, i.e. the 2 options in Chicago, on top of the $15K sign on bonus. There are other threads on the pay raise as well, but it seems that they're desperate for people to take their Chicago base.

Thanks for the info. I was aiming for Skywest because everybody says they are the best and they have a base at ORD, but would work for Envoy if it gives me a higher chance of being based at ORD.

I work here and I wouldn't say we're 'the best.' Saying 'the best regional' is like saying "Genuine Imitation Leather"...

Not if you have another career that requires you to be in the office most days...

CRJ-700 equals a guarantee of ORD if that's your thing.

At Skywest ORD is junior (not as junior as the freshly opened DTW base but still very junior relative to other bases).
On the 175 there are currently a lot of reserves in ORD so I'm not sure how many are getting ORD 175 as of now.
CRJ you'll be able to get ORD out of training.

Are LGA/JFK/EWR Commutable from DCA/IAD?
 

I understand commuting sucks and should be avoided at all costs, but just playing the odds. For the handful of regionals that have NYC bases, is it easy/moderately painful/very painful to commute to any of the three from DC? Best case would be a job with a DC base since we have no intention of moving, but I understand it may be awhile after training to get it.

Thanks.

I can't fathom how you'd be able to juggle both

If your commute was a 45 minute flight to your base from home, with 3-5 flights a day, that can't be that terrible right?

Whens the last flight? Whens the first flight? When do you start a trip? When do you end a trip? 3 to 5 is not good. You want to be able to travel the day of. Something I managed to do with Mesa 90% of the time.

I bid weekend trips and split duties. This year I've only been out of my office for 3 days due to airline flying. It's not easy but can be done. The split duties are the key, though.

I used to commute and probably had one of the easiest commutes ever, but it still sucked. I had 4 flights a day (1:25 flight time) all on my own metal with basically no competition from my own airline for the jumpseat. I was senior enough to bid commutable trips and only had to spend 2-3 nights in domicile over the course of 2 years. I would usually just give myself one leg up arriving 1-2 hours before my report and I never missed a trip. Once my commute flight was scheduled in 1 minute before my report time.

Even as easy as a commute as I had I still would avoid it like the plague, at least for a regional. There was still always that uncertainty of if/when you'd get home (sometimes I'd make the last flight but it could be delayed a few hours for wx or mx). Sometimes on weekends with a reduced schedule I'd finish a trip and have to wait 4-6 hours for my flight home just bumming around the airport. Later trip starts were nice but after having to get up at 6 to catch an 8 am flight to make a 12 pm report followed by 5 legs getting to the hotel at midnight still was no fun.

I have been very fortunate to never have had to commute to reserve. That always sounded like pure torture.

Can anyone speak on commuting for Endeavor? With a commute from BOS with plenty of flights each day, would the "2 flights to get to base" rule allow you to commute day of? I would assume it depends on your show time

BOS to NY is about as easy as it gets. In the nearly 5 years I've been doing it I've had to spend the night in NY only 3-4 times. Having 2 flights is easy when early in the morning there is a JB headed to JFK at 545, then a DL at 6 and an AA at 615. Obviously if you get one of those 630a shows you're coming in the night before, but those are rare.

It still sucks to commute, but if you have to, it doesn't get much better than BOS-NY.

That sounds horrible to me. My flight is blocked at about 1:40, but I have 15 flights per day on my own airline and about 10 more on other airlines. There is more than a flight per hour. 3-5 flights means you have to sit at the airport for hours waiting to sign in of go home.

Do airlines have an incentive to TRY and place pilots in a base located in their home town with no commute? Or do airlines not care if pilots commute?

From a logic standpoint placing pilots in a base in their home town seems like a win-win for numerous reasons: Pilots more likely to show up on time, pilots are less fatigued, airlines more likely to retain pilots b/c of higher job satisfaction, etc.

In other words: If I live in DEN, and get a job at Skywest as FO, would Skywest have an incentive to place me in DEN? Or, would Skywest not care that I live in DEN and determine where I'm placed based solely on Skywest's needs?

*I'm not the original poster. Just curious for my own path.

They don't have any direct incentive of where you live/are based. The indirect incentive would be like you mentioned there would be less missed commutes if you can drive to work.
Either way they don't really care. If you don't make it to work for missing a commute or fatigue they will just use a reserve. Reserves are budgeted into their costs.

No, it's all seniority based. Be prepared to commute until you are able to hold Denver. If that's where you live.