I have been wondering the same. Aug 9 interview and still waiting patiently.

I came from 91/135 week on/off rotations away from home. The only things I miss is some of the cool clients I got to develop relationships with, and the randomness of where I could be each night.
Now, no more phone call, leave the hotel, file flight plan, fuel, load bags, and verify catering all in under two hours. Also, no more knowing I'm missing some important event months out because it's on my week on. At least here you got the flexibility (depends on fleet/base) to drop/move days, and bid the schedule. I am home an extra 4-5 days a month with lines. Wife and kids love it. I haven't missed anything, yet. If I want some randomness, I just bid reserve and see where the winds take me.

Happy Camper

Is there a certain type/base that tends to provide a good quality of life for a family? I’m currently about an hour commute from NYC/ATL/DTW. Not opposed down the road to moving to ATL to be in base, but if I don’t move there and decide to commute to one of those 3 bases, what equipment tends to provide a better chance of good quality of life or seniority movement?

QOL means different things for different people/families. If you’re more specific about what QOL would look like for your personal situation, you’ll get better responses. Do weekends matter to you? Holidays? Can you be gone long stretches if total time away is reduced? Does your spouse implode if you’re away five days? Does income matter? To what degree? Where are you commuting from with what kind of mainline frequency? Could you drive in a pinch? Do you mind redeyes? Time zone changes?

QOL is a loaded question, as stated above, because it is different for everyone. Talk to people you know here. Talk to your family. Figure out what they want. And what you want. If $$ is important, NYC CA can be an excellent way to maximize $$ early on. If time off/schedule is important, easiest commute to junior BES that allows biggest seniority gain. It’s all about your goals.

So, generically, a WB will give you more time at home, but you'll be extremely junior for a long time. So working most (every?) weekends, and major holidays. But the trips are generally all very commutable and efficient. On the other hand a NB will give you more control over your schedule/days of work much faster, but by and large you'll be gone more days from home each month, especially if you get some uncommutable trips and have to come in a day early or stay a day late to get home. However, you'll shoot up the seniority list much faster on a NB and in well less than a year (or even just a few months in NYC) you could be holding weekends/holidays off.

Also, as others have mentioned, you'll shoot up in seniority much faster in NYC, at least up to the point where people ahead of you aren't bailing out to their desired bases.

Can one eventually bid reserve for a specific airport? Or to exclude one (EWR)? I was disappointed when Endeavor stopped treating the NY airports as seperate bases!

By hour commute, I'm assuming you mean hour-ish flight.

I live in Virginia Beach, VA and commute out of Norfolk (ORF).
Pre-Covid we had one stop to MSP, DTW, ATL and NYC

Currently, we have ~7 a day to NYC, 6 to ATL, 2-4 to DTW depending on day, and very rarely a direct MSP (not daily)

From here, if sitting NYC Long Call, there's about a 2-3 hour window (closer to 4 unless you are AT THE AIRPORT) where you cannot make a 12 hour callout. but the drive is 6-7 hours. I (off probation) will sit long call at home and judge the likelihood of being used vs not, plus road conditions and base my decision to drive accordingly.
ATL is a 10-12 hour drive. DTW is similar, but across a mountain range (so bad wx considerations)

That said, we are looking at leaving the area eventually. The resort area isn't that fun once you've lived here more than a season, and while there is everything you "need" here I find myself driving substantial distances to do anything but the beach. We moved back here from Wyoming ( I was working an oilfield engineering job) when I got a "live anywhere" overseas contracting job because we owned a house here, and my reserve unit was here. Now I'm retired from the reserves, a lot of my wifes friends have moved away (support network for her when I was in Afghanistan/Africa for 3 months at a stretch flying King Airs was a prime reason to leave Wyoming)

Example.. Wife needs to go try on a bridesmaid dress for a friends wedding.. Yep. Closest place for that chain is Richmond (100 miles)

If I want to shoot long guns outdoors, the nearest range is still close to an hour, and $1250 a year for just you. Close to $2000 for you+spouse.

Dirtbikes: Closest legal place to ride is an hour, no traffic but has very random hours. Like they say they are open, you go there, and gate is locked. Closest "open everyday" place is 93 miles one way. A nice MX race track that is open weekly for practice on Wednesdays, is 84.

Mountain Bikes: Actually not horrible if you ride for training/fitness. I live on a rail trail that becomes paved single track 2 miles in, then unpaved jeep road/single-ish track that I can do a 15 mile out and back on where 10 is off pavement. But, that is the only long trail and god help you if the rangers or karens see you off the one marked trail. It can be made into a 24 mile out and back but the extra miles are all the Va Beach Oceanfront Boardwalk bike path.. So full of tourists that don't realize they are on the bike only path, and the boardwalk (where you can't ride) is RIGHT THERE 10 feet away. There are a couple smaller city parks with OK MTB terrain, but not much worth riding more than 2-3 times a month. Any "Fun" Trails are an hour drive or more inland.

Road Bikes (pedal). Virginia Beach has a fairly large bike path setup. Problem is they don't connect to each other well, leaving you with miles of riding down surface roads and cyclists getting hit is daily here. I stick to the MTB and minimize road crossings here. Norfolk is more Urban Cycling, with all the pluses and minuses that entails.

Beaches. We have them. I'm a block off one. I go maybe 2x a year. Wife goes weekly during season.. Beach season is roughly May-Sep here.. With random days in April and October that are hot and sunny.

Now, without knowing what your family does for fun it is hard to recommend a base/fleet for you. If you love 4 seasons and snow stuff, BOS 320 when it opens or any NYC fleet has the ability to have the best seniority for that fleet type, and close to the mountains (as in, drive there on your days off, if not live there close)

Total SoCal Surfer/Beach Bum crowd? LAX if you can afford it.

Florida Beaches/Disney? ATL in theory is the easiest commute, but there's a lot of FL types that go to NYC. Not short, but a lot of options, not just on us.

No.

You can yellow slip any EWR trips that hit open time, but will still be assigned JFK and LGA trips.

If you ground commute to EWR/NYC, you can base your availability for short call off EWR (~2.5 hours to show) and if they give you a JFK/LGA trip in say 2 hours you tell skeds you will be there when you can safely be. Now flipside to that, I was given a EWR trip off short call, that reported in the past, called crew scheduling, told them it would be at least 3 hours as I was at JFK and it is rush hour (my crashpad is just off the airtrain) and they said "how fast can you be at a gate at JFK" 'under an hour, faster if you authorize a cab to be expensed' and they swapped me to JFK.

But, any long call (12 hour notice) you have to make the published show at JFK/LGA even if it's involving going in during rush hour.

So I’m commuting from IND. NYC, ATL, DTW are all an an an easy flight from IND. Quality of life to me means days off. Whichever equipment can get me the most days off per month is what I’m looking at starting off. Thought about maybe looking at NYC/ATL 7ER B then after a few years go NYC/ATL 737 A when I have better seniority, but just depends on how life plays out. I appreciate all the responses!