Wanna get
Southwest to begin service to your city? Wanna write a check?
If some of you are scratching your heads over the news that
Southwest Airlines is going to start service from "Northwest Florida's New International Airport near Panama City, Florida" in May 2010, all one needs to do is take a look at the fine print in an SEC filing from the
St. Joe Company -- a major land developer in the Florida panhandle.
We haven't yet discussed the current New York slot swaps yet because we wanted to take a little time and digest. For those of you not paying attention, this airline game of Wife Swap (a TV show, really) has got Continental and
AirTran trading a few slots at Washington National/
LGA for Newark and a huge transfer between Delta and
USAirways at New York
LGA and Washington National.
First,
AirTran and
Continental announce a slot swap involving slots at Newark, Reagan National and LaGuardia on Tuesday. But the scope of that deal was swamped this morning with news that
US Airways and
Delta Air Lines have agreed to terms on a much larger deal that involves both a swap of slots, and a few routes thrown in for good measure.
This morning
US Airways announced that it will obtain 42 pairs of slots at Reagan National, as well as access to slots in Tokyo (NRT) and Sao Paulo, Brazil (GRU) from
Delta Air Lines.
Another day, another round of airline earnings reports--and yet another notice from
Standard & Poor's that another airline is now on credit watch, with further rating downgrades a distinct possibility.
