LOOKING TO COMPETE WITH US AIRWAYS?
SkyTeam member Delta Air Lines has announced that it will add a twice-daily service to New Orleans which will begin March 3rd 2011. The route will be operated by Comair with regional CRJ700 aircraft. The route will compete directly with US Airways which operates up to four daily rotations with E175 equipment, and comes at a time when Delta has continued to put pressure on the market leader, US Airways at Washington Reagan.
The new service to New Orleans comes on the back of winter expansion, when it commenced new scheduled service from DCA to Columbus, OH, Hartford, Jacksonville, Miami, Orlando, St Louis and Tampa, whilst increasing existing services to Boston, Indianapolis and Huntsville.
The increase in services to Boston was largely triggered by the fact American Airlines discontinued its scheduled service to Boston in June. The pressure that Delta is attempting to put on US Airways is illustrated that all of Delta’s new routes from DCA, with the exception of St Louis and Miami, are operated by US Airways, whilst US Airways also operates scheduled links to Boston, Indianapolis and Huntsville where Delta has ramped up capacity.
US Airways remains the dominant carrier at Washington Reagan as the table below demonstrates
|
Airline |
Weekly Flights |
Destinations |
Market Share |
|
US Airways |
1235 |
47 |
45% |
|
Delta Air Lines |
647 |
22 |
23% |
|
American Airlines |
345 |
7 |
12% |
|
Continental |
128 |
3 |
5% |
|
United Airlines |
101 |
2 |
4% |
|
Others |
315 |
11% |
|
|
Total |
2771 |
100% |
Source Flightbase 14-20 November 2010
WASHINGTON REAGAN: A VALUABLE MARKET
Early November also saw the launch of low-cost service from Washington National with JetBlue Airways securing valuable slots to begin a seven-times daily service to Boston, whilst also operating a daily flight to Fort Lauderdale and Orlando.
With limited gate availability at Washington Reagan, Delta appears to be keen to expand in a market with strong business traffic given its proximity to the centre of the US capital. The US Airways shuttle brand with operates services between Washington Reagan, LaGuardia NYC, and Boston has been a profitable part of the carriers domestic strategy and Delta will be keen to increase completion in these important markets.
WHERE NEXT FOR DELTA?
Delta Air Lines may continue to put pressure on US Airways in markets that are only operated by US, such as Albany, Columbia (CAE), Buffalo, Charleston or Huntsville.
Delta does operate a B757 into Washington DCA from home markets, Atlanta and Salt Lake City, although it could look to operate non-served points such as San Diego, an unserved market of 129,000 O+D passengers annually, or San Francisco, an unserved market of 133,000.
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