Quote:
Originally Posted by twister244
Anyways - Tying this back to Steely's comment..... I could see MDW becoming a mini-hub for LCC airlines that may not want to pay the fees of O'Hare to operate out of if SW begins to free up some gates under a reduced capacity in the future.
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Knowing that any speculation is all guesswork without any deep industry insider knowledge I could very well see after all this Southwest adopting a more hub-spoke configuration, even if still not to the extant of its rivals. The potential cogs in having crews dispersed all over the nation just lends itself to a cascade of issues system wide when negative conditions arise.
If that scenario plays out my guess is Southwest will increase their position at Denver to an even greater degree, with Denver being THE major SWA hub. SWA's has effectively maxed themselves at Midway which means if they do centralize they likely would have to grow at an expanded O'Hare. I also wouldn't be at all surprised to see Delta uptick an increased presence at O'Hare. These two moves would in fact push the other LCC's to Midway filling up abandoned SWA's slots at Midway.