Age is used after the returning furloughed pilots (not Mil Leave return) get what they want out of the drop. 737 to IAD will probably be the best bet for you...

There have been recent unfilled 737 vacancies in both IAD, or bid as DCA, and EWR. If by some chance your class doesn't get any IAD vacancies, you will most certainly have lot of EWR's to choose from.

The good thing about the 737, if you don't get IAD out of class, you can probably get a lateral to IAD fairly quickly, like on the order of 1-3 months.

Welcome!

So how far of a drive to base is too far? I'd be looking at either a 3 or 4 hour drive depending on certain factors if I were fortunate enough to get hired someday. Doable? Or not fun?

Depends on how much you like driving. Depends on how soon you can get off reserve and drive to a trip every week. I would not like that at all, but I fly with plenty of folks that drive 3-4 hours and dont mind it cause they live where they want, grew up, lower cost of living, etc. I drive 1 hour and its perfect because I live in the most beautiful part of the country, can make a short call easily so I can bid reserve if I want and its a nice wind down from the trip with being so long that its tiring. good luck

U need to be within 2.5 hours drive time if assigned short call... So most pilots who live semi local are within this range...