Southwest to buy Airtran

[Andrea J.]

:-) this could be an awesome thing. (jimo) we have flown both and hope that it'll be a good match.
SWA needed to get into some of Air Tran's markets especially the few international locations (including aruba!)

[Arubalisa]

http://www.businessweek.com/news/201...4-billion.html

Welcome to Atlanta, the world's busiest airport. Southwest REALLY wanted "in" here and access to the Caribbean and Mexico Hopefully they will continue with the same great bargains that Air Tran has been consistently offering to Aruba.

[tavilas]

Thats Great news....maybe they will offer more flights to Aruba now and I could fly out of Providence instead of Boston.

[Arubalisa]

One can only hope. We would love the option of being able to fly mid-week instead of just Saturday to Saturday or Sunday.

http://www.ajc.com/business/southwes...or-639413.html

Our local Atlanta's paper opening line
"Southwest Airlines is buying AirTran Airways for $1.4 billion, giving Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport passengers more options for low-cost tickets without the fees other airlines have adopted."

Unfortunately at this time, Delta does not charge for the first bag on International flights.

[Chadd]

Aruba doesn't fit the traditional Southwest model at all. They prefer markets where they can fly 6-8 times a day at a minimum. The purchase was aimed much more at getting more access to places like DCA, LGA, ATL and CLT, than it was about cities (or countries) that see one or two flights a day. Airtran has a number of 737-700 deliveries scheduled in the near future, something Southwest wants so they can retire the rest of their 737-300s.

Southwest also gains the computer systems and certificate type that will allow them to handle international flights, but I would expect them to focus on the places that fit the way they have traditionally operated. Cancun, Cabo, Bahamas, Toronto, etc... are more likely to see Southwest aircraft than Aruba for the long term.

[Arubalisa]

Chadd, your guess on the possibility of SW dropping Aruba?

[Chadd]

Originally Posted by Arubalisa

Chadd, your guess on the possibility of SW dropping Aruba?

Unless they implement flights from a number of their hubs (though they prefer not to call them that) like BWI, MDW, DEN, DAL, ATL, etc and really increase capacity to places like Aruba, I think it will be dropped with 24 months. Just for the record, I don't see them adding flights from all of those places.

From what I've heard, the plan on having joint contracts in place by the end of next year and that is when you will see major changes really start to take place. That is when we will know if they are going to operate some of the low frequency destinations that airtran operated or convert fully to the southwest model.

My prediction:
Any city that doesn't currently see at least 6 flights a day between the two airlines, or the ability to quickly grow into that number (or more), will lose service.

[LynnB.]

My hubby agrees with Chadd. SW usually only does flights where they can turn their planes around very quickly.

[Arubalisa]

Thank you all for the insight on Southwest. Our family will stick with Delta.

[jdoll]

Southwest is changing their Rapid Rewards program and the interesting part is they are promoting .. you will now be able to redeem rewards for International flights. My assumption would be this means they will keep the AirTrans route to Aruba when they acquire AirTran later this year.