Winnipeg James Armstrong Richardson International Airport

[rkspec]

Originally Posted by Jammon

The artwork is the only thing I miss about the old terminal.

i miss flying that little helicopter

[esquire]

Originally Posted by rkspec

i miss flying that little helicopter

Good news! It's at the Aviation Museum.

Funny that everyone mentions the little helicopter but no one ever gets nostalgic for those crappy B&W TVs that would allow you to drop in a quarter to watch a couple of fuzzy channels for like 15 minutes.

[jmt18325]

Originally Posted by Pinus

Huh, I did not realise this service was seasonal, just assumed it was year round. Don't see why it couldn't be.

It was year round - it just went seasonal this year. Air Canada is probably eating their lunch on that route the same way that they eat Air Canada's to Edmonton.

On that note, some disappointing news - it appears that our newly minted CR9 service to Edmonton will go back to the Q400 starting May 1.

[esquire]

^ I'm assuming Flair's dirt cheap Edmonton fares has made AC more or less give up on that route? I would think it's mostly just people flying on corporate accounts who take AC to YEG these days.

[jmt18325]

Originally Posted by esquire

^ I'm assuming Flair's dirt cheap Edmonton fares has made AC more or less give up on that route? I would think it's mostly just people flying on corporate accounts who take AC to YEG these days.

Air Canada seems to be matching their fares at this point - ~$100 each way for pretty much any date in the future.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by jmt18325

Air Canada seems to be matching their fares at this point - ~$100 each way for pretty much any date in the future.

They have no choice but to match, otherwise the planes would be empty... but it's forcing them to withdraw to minimal levels of service.

[rkspec]

Originally Posted by esquire

Good news! It's at the Aviation Museum.

yaaaas

[Rookie00]

With AC resuming mainline on the YWG-YUL route... I wonder if they would consider flying mainline on the YYC route once again. It's been a few years, but i vaguely remember flying on a E190 on the route in the early 2010's. Besides, on a normal day theres 10 flights total with WS and AC so there must be demand for at least a E190/A319

[jmt18325]

Air Canada isn’t as strong as WestJet in YYC. The frequency of 4 per day is probably pretty much the minimum as far as connections are concerned. There’s also the reality that Air Canada has been moving more from a 4 hub model to a 3 hub model with Calgary playing a less important role.

[Authentic_City]

Interesting story about how a direct flight between YWG and LAX would help the film industry in MB. For example, Winnipeg lost out on the TV show "Fargo" to Calgary because of the lack of direct flight.

Sadly, WestJet isn't even pretending to be interested in a direct connection.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manito...g-la-1.4473814

[esquire]

^ Given that Winnipeg has sustained a flight to Palm Springs for some time now, one to neighbouring LAX shouldn't be that far fetched. People go down there for any number of reasons (cruises, vacations, business, Trans-Pacific air connections)... you would think it would make sense. I guess the distance starts to play into it a bit... it must be at or near the limits of regional jets?

[Authentic_City]

If WestJet can fly it's 737s to Orlando or Palm Springs from YWG, I'm sure LAX is possible. Not sure about the regional jets.

Sounds to me like WJ is happy to keep routing us through Calgary or Vancouver hubs.

[esquire]

^ No question LAX is within range of 737s, but the thinking behind my earlier statement is that RJs might be more feasible if the larger aircraft aren't.

Anyway, I googled it and it turns out the AC E190 has a range of 2200 mi, the CR9 can do 1726 mi and the Q400 can do 1567 mi. (YWG-LAX is 1541 mi) So really it's only the E190 that can do it reliably among smaller RJs, and then you're up into the A320/737-series type jets.

The E190 has 97 seats, compared to the A319 which has 120.

I don't know for sure, I'm obviously not an airline guy. But as I said before, considering Winnipeg already has a 737 going to PSP several times a week on WS, an E190 once a day to LAX doesn't seem like a huge stretch especially if AC's Star Alliance partners use it to feed traffic through LAX. Travelling to California can be somewhat gruelling thing given the distances and connections involved... a flight to LAX would certainly bring that part of the world closer to home.

[Authentic_City]

^Ah, good points. Unless WJ invests in some smaller regional jets, service to LAX seems unlikely for WJ in the short term. Their Palm Springs service is 3x per week and only seasonal, so the larger planes make sense. Year round daily service would definitely require smaller jets to be feasible. I can't say I'm too optimistic about it, but perhaps AC someday?

[esquire]

Originally Posted by Authentic_City

^Ah, good points. Unless WJ invests in some smaller regional jets, service to LAX seems unlikely for WJ in the short term. Their Palm Springs service is 3x per week and only seasonal, so the larger planes make sense. Year round daily service would definitely require smaller jets to be feasible. I can't say I'm too optimistic about it, but perhaps AC someday?

AC doesn't seem to like flying to the US from anywhere but its hubs. Even Edmonton, which is a much bigger airport, doesn't have AC service to the US (although I think service to SFO is starting sometime this year).

If Winnipeg snagged a flight to LAX, I think it would most likely be on WS. And now that WS and DL are pseudo-partners, it could likely lead to a decent amount of connecting traffic heading to Asia/Oceania/South America on DL.

[Authentic_City]

If the lack of daily (or very frequent) year round direct flights to LAX is holding back the film industry in Winnipeg, it seems to me that this problem won't be solved if WJ eventually adds seasonal, once or twice weekly flights to LAX from Winnipeg. If WJ is our best hope, what are the odds they would add year round flights to Winnipeg, at say 3 times per week? That might make Winnipeg more attractive to LA based film companies, but still not as attractive as Calgary with several daily direct flights. Don't get me wrong, that would be great for Winnipeg, but I wonder if it would be enough to boost the film industry here, as they hope?

[Rookie00]

Maybe Delta? They already have multiple flights per day to MSP and have a hub in LA. The E175's are well within the range of YWG-LAX, perhaps a daily Delta Connection flight could work?

[Curmudgeon]

It would appear that there is not a sufficient market for YWG to LAX. Palm Springs is a seasonal destination for snowbirds, Los Angeles itself not so much. There are other cities the same size or even larger than Winnipeg that don't have direct service to Los Angeles. Oklahoma City has a metro of about 1.3 million and a connection is required if travelling to LAX.

More important to get some competition on the YWG-MSP route. The cheapest return ticket for travel in the next week is just under $1,000 for a 400 mile flight. As much as many European or even East Asian destinations!

[esquire]

3x would be an improvement, but still arguably inadequate. What about 5x or 6x? We're talking 113 seats on a WS 737-600. That's 565 seats a week if they ran 5 flights. It doesn't seem that wildly unattainable to me, especially if you aimed to have around 25% of those passengers making onward connections on Delta such that the route wouldn't be entirely dependent on California-bound traffic.

[Jammon]

Originally Posted by Rookie00

Maybe Delta? They already have multiple flights per day to MSP and have a hub in LA. The E175's are well within the range of YWG-LAX, perhaps a daily Delta Connection flight could work?

Correct me if I am wrong, but didn't YWG submit requests for service to LAX and Manilla? There is a website that I can't remember the name of for the life of me where airport authorities submit requests to airlines for service routes. But, I seem to remember rumours 10 years ago that YWG was getting a direct flight to LAX and it has never materialized..