No, not wide bodies, NAI's subsidized feeder jets.

You keep stating Skywest owns the gates. They don't and subleases must be approved by the ATL airport authority. They don't do that normally. The take back and reissue the gate.

That even assumes that ATL is some golden goose market. Its many multiplies bigger than its O&D demand because the excess is used by DL (and a lesser extent SWA) as an arbitrary hub. First of all there is zero chance anywhere close to that total number of gates would go to the feeders of ME3 and NAI scab FoC type airlines. It would probably be a small fraction of that. DL would likely end up with a significant amount anyway, and most of the rest would go to so called LCC's that don't code share with the vermin airlines you mentioned.

IOW, empty threat. Oh, and to any extent that SKYW actually has a say, which is very little BTW, DL would easily be the highest bidder for most of those gates, which they would desperately need the money from (again, even assuming they had much of a say) because if they did that then by definition they were losing a massive amount of their revenue and guaranteed profits. There is zero chance (again, even if they had a say) that they would pass up more money in order to try and harm a DL out of hubris.

Not worried about it in the slightest. But SKYW should be.

Again what is your point?

DL already has a large SWA presence in ATL, and as you know they are a fierce competitor. DL has done quite well against them. Any 27 gate new entrant would have to fight a two front war. It would actually be more than that for them, because they would have to go for the higher frequency routes and therefore also butt heads against ALG and Frontier and JB etc, so on the routes they would most likely do, they'd face razor thin margins.

And again, there is absolute zero chance a SKYW termination would result in all the gates going to a single new entrant airline. No chance at all. While you may relish the thought of an outgoing revenge strike on DL for blocking your ultra large RJ manifest destiny, its just not going to happen.

SKYW will only be permitted to operate your dream planes if they do it IndyAir style. And we all know how that will end up.

I don't mind the SKYW partnership at all. They are a good regional jet provider for sure. As long as they can keep their perf numbers up and stay within the hard limits of the DL and UAL agreements (to include pilot scope), great!

BTW DL didn't have a problem with SKYW flying for UAL as long as they could hold up their end of the PWA compliant CPA's. Up until now SKYW has run a good operation and have been able to do so. I'll give them credit for that all day long and have no issue with them as long as they stay within the constraints of what we permit them to do, which they will.

You sound more like a SKYW manager than a pilot, but either way that's cool. DL has dealt with managers with loftier ambitions than yours in the past (CMR, ACA, etc) and will do so again when necessary. Sorry to inform you that you will not be getting larger RJ's though. It simply will not be permitted. You will have to remain within the limits set by your existing CPA's and unionized pilot PWA's.

The size, weight and seat count is simply not going up for you. Sorry. The only thing that may happen is some kind of trade for more 76's in exchange for fewer 50's or 70's on a net seat/BH loss basis. We'll see what the next round of mainline PWA's does WRT that, but even that small carrot isn't looking good. But even if you do get that, you'll have to shrink to get it.

If it was going to happen it would have happened in this round of negotiations. This was when it was critical to launch the new airframes. Embraer has already acknowledged that nothing is going to change and put of the new version of the E175.