greenair727 wrote:

LifetimeGS wrote:

topbanana wrote:

When was this?

It was not, They flew CLE always.

They did serve BKL--but not non-stop to MKE. I just pulled an old Cleveland Flight Guide off the shelf. I thought it was non-stop, but it wasn't---but it was indeed BKL. I don't have every edition, but according to the May 15-June 30, 1992 edition, Midwest Express Flights 1181, 1183, 1185, and 1187 all flew BKL-Detroit City-and onward to MKE. An additional flight, 1189, only went to DET, and didn't continue on to MKE.

FYI it was actually Skyway, the Midwest Express Connection which was (at the time) operated by Mesa.

^what kind of paint job was a flight like that? Did it say Skyway or Midwest Express Connection? Was Skyway a separate company from YX?

Found a PRNewswire listing about this service. Perhaps before people hammer someone, saying something never happened...they could just google. It totally existed.

SKYWAY AIRLINES ANNOUNCES SERVICE TO DETROIT CITY AND MILWAUKEE
CLEVELAND, March 2 /PRNewswire/ -- Skyway Airlines today began nonstop service between Cleveland's Burke Lakefront Airport and Detroit City Airport with continuing service to Milwaukee.
According to Rolly Bergeson, president of Skyway, the new service consists of five round trip flights to Detroit City Airport each business day.
Bergeson said, ''The convenience of Lakefront Airport to downtown Cleveland, and the similar proximity of Detroit City Airport to Detroit's downtown and north side industrial complexes, together with five well-timed flights, offers the business travelers a new level of service between these major business centers.''
Skyway Airlines, based in Milwaukee, is the regional partner for Midwest Express Airlines, a premium class national airline also based in Milwaukee. Speaking of Skyway service, Jose E. Oller, vice president of marketing for Midwest Express Airlines, said, ''The new Skyway flights provide the business traveler with reliable, efficient air service between these cities. Skyway offers passengers a quality and reliability of service that is unique in the airline industry.''
With this new service, Skyway operates 128 weekday departures in 24 destinations in eight states in the Midwest. Skyway flies new state-of-the-art Beech 1900 Airliners, and is currently operating 12 aircraft. Skyway also serves Columbus, Ohio, to Milwaukee, and has a maintenance base in Columbus.
Mayor Michael White welcomes Skyway to the city: ''Skyway is a solid company. It has maintained profitability every year of operation, even through the recent worst years the airline industry has suffered.'' Mike Barth, commissioner of Burke Lakefront Airport, added, ''We recruited Skyway heavily and are thrilled to have them at Lakefront.''
Skyway employs six people at Lakefront. Reservation services are provided by Midwest Express Airlines. Ticketing and reservations are available through all travel agencies.
-0- 3/2/92
/CONTACT: Rolly Bergeson, president, Skyway Airlines, 414-762-6761/ CO: Skyway Airlines ST: Ohio IN: AIR SU: PDT

Any spotters of Bill Gates' plane this week?

Back to 10 years ago...
Hopkins goes back to the future October 18, 2017

Cleveland Hopkins International Airport (CLE) will begin ‘live’ testing of the airport’s new state of the art in-line baggage screening system for those air carriers (United, JetBlue, Southwest, Air Canada) on the south end of the ticketing lobby starting Thursday, October 19th.

“Cleveland Hopkins International Airport is one of the first airports in the U.S. to be equipped with this new Mobile Inspection Table technology,” said Mayor Frank G. Jackson. “This new in-line system will keep Cleveland’s airport on track with providing world class services for our customers making Cleveland an even better choice for your air travel needs.”

“Under the current system, passengers had to take their luggage to a separate TSA baggage screening drop-off location and with the completion of the new system on the south end they no longer need to take their baggage to a second location,” said Airport Director Robert Kennedy. “This project is a big win for the airport guests as it streamlines the baggage check-in process. We are literally going back to the way passengers handed off their baggage to airline personnel in the past.”

Previously, United Airlines was the only carrier to use an in-line baggage system at CLE. Once this project is fully completed in early 2018, all CLE airlines will use the new baggage security screening system accommodating future passenger growth and allowing checked bags to be processed more efficiently and timely. The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) will also gain staffing efficiencies and automate the customer’s bag handling experience, which had previously been done manually.

If all system testing is successfully completed by mid-November, the free-standing bag security screening machines on the south end of the ticketing level will be removed by the busy Thanksgiving holiday weekend; providing more space for passengers in the ticket lobby area.

greenair727 wrote:

^what kind of paint job was a flight like that? Did it say Skyway or Midwest Express Connection? Was Skyway a separate company from YX?

Mesa Airlines operated Skyway, the Midwest Express Connection in 1989 with a five-year contract. They flew Beech 1900C aircraft -- if you see a Skyway picture with an registration ending in YV it's Mesa.

Skyway was something of a speculative project which started out with there aircraft and from all accounts it did better than expected, quickly growing to six and ultimately twelve aircraft, providing connecting feed to Midwest Express but more notably serving a lot of point-to-point business traffic which never connected with Midwest Express flights. Many of these routes were out of Midwest's Milwaukee hub, something whic Midwest favored as it helped the utility of their brand. But in the early 90's Mesa put more an more Skyway resources away from Milwaukee. You could find Skyway the Midwest Express Connection in markets such as Baltimore-Columbus, Flint-Rochester, Midway-Louisville, Columbus-Rochester-Buffalo-Columbus and Rockford-Detroit, Some of these did operated one-stop from Milwaukee (such as Milwaukee-Midway-Louisville) but they were largely not about building the Milwaukee hub. Cleveland BKL - Detroit DET was one of these routes, with several flights continuing on to Milwaukee. It only lasted about six months.

As a side note Midwest Express chose not to renew the Mesa contract and start their own in-house airline Astral Aviation to operate Skyway. This would give them control over where their regional brand was flying and allowed more synergy to the MKE hub. Mesa was decidedly angry about this and pulled out of the Midwest contract to switch allegiance to America West before Astral Aviation was ready to run. Mesa kept flying (as America West Express) the best routes it had flown as Skyway and for much of 1993-1094 the new Skyway and Mesa (as America West competed) on such unlikely routes as Milwaukee-Indianapolis and Detroit-Rockford. Eventually Mesa focused everything on the America West hub in Columbus. Midwest did launch Cleveland with DC9's flying MKE-CLE and Skyway Beech 1900D flights joined the route, but by that time it was no longer Mesa and was instead Astral operating as Skyway into Cleveland, now CLE. Pictures of Beech 1900's in Skyway colors with registration ending in SK are Astral and are 1900D's, where Mesa flew 1900C's

fun2fly wrote:

We already have 20+ very nice gates not being used.

Leaving out Concourse D, which will probably be reconfigured for a smaller number of 737/320-sized gates when brought back into use, there aren't as many empty gates as it might seem at CLE. There is nothing in B, B1 being effectively unusable, a couple on the good side of A, and a couple more operationally undesirable ones on the back of A. The five vacancies in C are really more like 2, if you consider C1 is blocked and two others are very regularly used by AA/B6 for overflows.

If anybody (WN or AA, for more and less likely possibilites) wanted to expand CLE to 50 or so departures, it would be a practical necessity to bring D back online.

Anyone know when the VS charters are heading in? I know the fan charter leaves Wed evening , but expect the team flt to be before that!

I saw a Browns article on Cleveland.com that mentions the team leaving Thurs. evening.

knope2001 wrote:

Mesa Airlines operated Skyway, the Midwest Express Connection in 1989 with a five-year contract. They flew Beech 1900C aircraft -- if you see a Skyway picture with an registration ending in YV it's Mesa.

Knope---thanks for the detailed information on Skyway and its intersection with BKL.

greenair727 wrote:

knope2001 wrote:

Mesa Airlines operated Skyway, the Midwest Express Connection in 1989 with a five-year contract. They flew Beech 1900C aircraft -- if you see a Skyway picture with an registration ending in YV it's Mesa.

Knope---thanks for the detailed information on Skyway and its intersection with BKL.

You're welcome -- I remember being disappointed it did not succeed.

I'd be curious to hear people's thoughts on what led to regional flights not working at Burke. Certainly Wright going out of business was a big blow, but I believe Comair tried BKL-DET as DL* for a time as well and it didn't last. Is CLE too convenient to downtown to make the time saved at BKL not worth much? Did downtown Cleveland's relative decline in the 80's mean too many business travelers were coming from other parts of the metro area where BKL wasn't useful? Was the issue for BKL-DET as much or more about changes in metro Detroit's geography? Or is Detroit simply too short of a drive even in 1990's-era security?

BKL-DET in particular just seems like it should have worked for much longer than it did. Thoughts?

BKL-DET actually did work for quite a while. As far back as I can remember when I was a kid it was TAG Airlines, then Wright which was there for some time, and then sporadically Comair, Skyway, the original Midway Airlines had DC-9 service there, and Continental Connection too. Now its Ultimate. There's a market for BKL, albeit a small one, and not really to Detroit anymore. As you mentioned, its just too close as its only a 2.5 hr drive...maybe a 1/2 tank of gas. Industry changes, cities adapt, markets change.

Back in the 70s it was Wright and North Central Convair's into DET and DTW respectively.....and it was all day long, not just 2-3 flights. Now its just Delta to DTW and you're most likely connecting. Those Convair's were a treat to watch.

knope, I think BKL was killed mainly by better roads. Locally, access to CLE from eastern and southeastern metropolitan areas improved greatly and regionally both Detroit and downstate Ohio got to be easier drives. The price and flexibility of driving beat the time saving of flying.

masseybrown wrote:

knope, I think BKL was killed mainly by better roads. Locally, access to CLE from eastern and southeastern metropolitan areas improved greatly and regionally both Detroit and downstate Ohio got to be easier drives. The price and flexibility of driving beat the time saving of flying.

I think 90 and 480 made the drive time bearable.

First charter for the Brown's London game is enroute:

http://flightaware.com/live/flight/VIR9 ... /EGLL/KCLE

swacle wrote:

First charter for the Brown's London game is enroute:

http://flightaware.com/live/flight/VIR9 ... /EGLL/KCLE

That's a loooong ferry flight. I expected it would come from one of their US points.

swacle wrote:

First charter for the Brown's London game is enroute:

http://flightaware.com/live/flight/VIR9 ... /EGLL/KCLE

That’s appears to be the fan charter booked thru prime sports,think the team departs tomorrow

Is the team charter still scheduled as a 346?

Today's inbound is apparently a 787-9.

It’s cool that virgin Atlantic has partnership with the nfl but having that beautiful bird on the ground sure doesn’t provide much marketing value in the Cleveland market! And not only because the Browns stink and are an embarrassing association. If I wasn’t an airline nerd I wouldn’t even know how to fly Virgin from Cleveland.

Photo of the VS 789 on the tarmac:

https://twitter.com/GoingPlacesCLE/stat ... 5975687168

SgtBarone wrote:

Photo of the VS 789 on the tarmac:

https://twitter.com/GoingPlacesCLE/stat ... 5975687168

Sweet ride.

Even more impressive that some plane geek now exists at CLE and posted it timely! The CLE website is getting a lot better.

Thanks for posting. I wondered when they were being escorted out of town and on what.

VS938 A346 due CLE from LHR at 1537. No departure time filed yet.

SgtBarone wrote:

Photo of the VS 789 on the tarmac:

A couple of us caught the 787-9 landing/parked:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/73886013@ ... ateposted/

https://www.flickr.com/photos/chris_jac ... ed-public/

SgtBarone wrote:

Photo of the VS 789 on the tarmac:

https://twitter.com/GoingPlacesCLE/stat ... 5975687168

Did my 60 year old mom take that photo with a Nokia?

masseybrown wrote:

VS938 A346 due CLE from LHR at 1537. No departure time filed yet.

Suspected to be the first time CLE has seen an A340-600.

Does flightaware.com intentionally not list certain activity at airports? I spotted a Canadian jet yesterday at BKL--registration C-FNCG, departing around 18:05 yesterday (25 Oct) and was just curious about it. But when I looked at the logs for BKL departures yesterday, it does not appear. This also means that BKL could be a lot busier than it appears according to flightaware or flightstats and the like.

knope2001 wrote:

I'd be curious to hear people's thoughts on what led to regional flights not working at Burke. Certainly Wright going out of business was a big blow, but I believe Comair tried BKL-DET as DL* for a time as well and it didn't last. Is CLE too convenient to downtown to make the time saved at BKL not worth much? Did downtown Cleveland's relative decline in the 80's mean too many business travelers were coming from other parts of the metro area where BKL wasn't useful? Was the issue for BKL-DET as much or more about changes in metro Detroit's geography? Or is Detroit simply too short of a drive even in 1990's-era security?

BKL-DET in particular just seems like it should have worked for much longer than it did. Thoughts?

Don't know about all cases, but I think competition with Hopkins played a role for airlines that moved there. Regarding Wright, I heard that BKL was good and profitable for them, but they expanded their network too fast and did themselves in. Regarding services to DET, it may have more to do with the economy of CLE (and Detroit) and demand for air service to Detroit in general (whether BKL-DET or CLE-DTW). Cleveland Port Control seems to intentionally not market Burke, hence the lack of new/different services, such as to Toronto, Chicago, NYC, etc. There was an UNSPOKEN, never 'official' (probably not legal) agreement it is said between Cleveland airport officials and Continental/United that the city would not allow commercial flights at BKL as it would compete with Hopkins and thus compete with CO/UA.

With WN’s schedule extension next week, I wonder if CLE will get any new routes? The airport hinted at a WN expansion earlier this summer, so perhaps this will be when it gets announced. The WN MKE service also starts up soon and fares look bargain basement with UA and WN slashing fares to match each other.

^I thought they hinted at SLC--which could be DL as well. Or did they also specifically hint at WN? Would happily take both...

lakeeffect wrote:

With WN’s schedule extension next week, I wonder if CLE will get any new routes? The airport hinted at a WN expansion earlier this summer, so perhaps this will be when it gets announced. The WN MKE service also starts up soon and fares look bargain basement with UA and WN slashing fares to match each other.

The MKE fare wars are fueling a lot of weird routings on UA. CLE>MKE>DEN>LIH was $100 cheaper than CLE>DEN>LIH the other day.

greenair727 wrote:

Does flightaware.com intentionally not list certain activity at airports? I spotted a Canadian jet yesterday at BKL--registration C-FNCG, departing around 18:05 yesterday (25 Oct) and was just curious about it. But when I looked at the logs for BKL departures yesterday, it does not appear. This also means that BKL could be a lot busier than it appears according to flightaware or flightstats and the like.

Flightaware does not display VFR flights; and other flights that would normally appear can choose not to be publicly tracked - ATC would know, but not somebody wanting to figure out why Company X's corp. jet was in Cleveland, for example.

greenair727 wrote:

^I thought they hinted at SLC--which could be DL as well. Or did they also specifically hint at WN? Would happily take both...

I thought they hinted at MCI, which everyone assumed would be WN.

cledaybuck wrote:

greenair727 wrote:

^I thought they hinted at SLC--which could be DL as well. Or did they also specifically hint at WN? Would happily take both...

I thought they hinted at MCI, which everyone assumed would be WN.

Ah, that could be it. Sorry--was mixing up the places out west....

masseybrown wrote:

greenair727 wrote:

Does flightaware.com intentionally not list certain activity at airports? I spotted a Canadian jet yesterday at BKL--registration C-FNCG, departing around 18:05 yesterday (25 Oct) and was just curious about it. But when I looked at the logs for BKL departures yesterday, it does not appear. This also means that BKL could be a lot busier than it appears according to flightaware or flightstats and the like.

Flightaware does not display VFR flights; and other flights that would normally appear can choose not to be publicly tracked - ATC would know, but not somebody wanting to figure out why Company X's corp. jet was in Cleveland, for example.

That's too bad. It'd be nice to see a full public listing of activity at an airport. It could be done--if a plane owner/operator didn't want to be tracked, the registration could be withheld, but the origin, destination, and times could be shown. (And for tiny places, only speculation would exist around certain flights--as I remember when an Idaho company bought Cleveland-based Office Max, people noticed flights from Idaho to Cleveland.....) Currently, if flightaware lists a flight they include O&D details AND reg number---I'd rather have the O&D data without the reg number if necessary than not have the O&D data at all.

greenair727 wrote:

^I thought they hinted at SLC--which could be DL as well. Or did they also specifically hint at WN? Would happily take both...

If it's WN, we'll know 11/2. If it's DL, we'll know? I need to book a SLC flight in Feb and would like to use the direct service.

fun2fly wrote:

greenair727 wrote:

^I thought they hinted at SLC--which could be DL as well. Or did they also specifically hint at WN? Would happily take both...

If it's WN, we'll know 11/2. If it's DL, we'll know? I need to book a SLC flight in Feb and would like to use the direct service.

By now aren't Feb schedules pretty much set? Any add would be May or later I would think (June for WN).

Stumbled on this article while looking something else up:

http://www.modernhealthcare.com/article ... /171009925

It's not breaking news but I don't think it's ever been discussed on these boards. The Cleveland ClInic London will be operational by 2020. Would it attract enough cross-ocean business travel to increase the odds of getting BA service at CLE.

From what I read Cleveland Clinic Abu Dhabi is doing outstanding as well. While I know there's not enough traffic yet to attract an ME3 carrier could the Clinic's continued expansion in Cleveland and Abu Dhabi lead to some sort of service?

I guess I'm asking can you fill J in a widebody to the Middle East with not much in Y and still want to operate the aircraft? The Middle Eastern population in NE Ohio is pretty small compared to Detroit. Just curious what you all think.

izbtmnhd wrote:

Stumbled on this article while looking something else up:

http://www.modernhealthcare.com/article ... /171009925

It's not breaking news but I don't think it's ever been discussed on these boards. The Cleveland ClInic London will be operational by 2020. Would it attract enough cross-ocean business travel to increase the odds of getting BA service at CLE.

From what I read Cleveland Clinic Abu Dhabi is doing outstanding as well. While I know there's not enough traffic yet to attract an ME3 carrier could the Clinic's continued expansion in Cleveland and Abu Dhabi lead to some sort of service?

I guess I'm asking can you fill J in a widebody to the Middle East with not much in Y and still want to operate the aircraft? The Middle Eastern population in NE Ohio is pretty small compared to Detroit. Just curious what you all think.

If BA and or AA were able to get the Cleveland Clinic contract to support the flight including all the traffic to LON and AUH, there would not be any reason that this would not be a good route. There is a lot of traffic: a neighbor just flew his family of 4 to AUH in business class as part of a few year relocation to the region for CCF and they will have several trips during their two year stay.

fun2fly wrote:

izbtmnhd wrote:

Stumbled on this article while looking something else up:

http://www.modernhealthcare.com/article ... /171009925

It's not breaking news but I don't think it's ever been discussed on these boards. The Cleveland ClInic London will be operational by 2020. Would it attract enough cross-ocean business travel to increase the odds of getting BA service at CLE.

From what I read Cleveland Clinic Abu Dhabi is doing outstanding as well. While I know there's not enough traffic yet to attract an ME3 carrier could the Clinic's continued expansion in Cleveland and Abu Dhabi lead to some sort of service?

I guess I'm asking can you fill J in a widebody to the Middle East with not much in Y and still want to operate the aircraft? The Middle Eastern population in NE Ohio is pretty small compared to Detroit. Just curious what you all think.

If BA and or AA were able to get the Cleveland Clinic contract to support the flight including all the traffic to LON and AUH, there would not be any reason that this would not be a good route. There is a lot of traffic: a neighbor just flew his family of 4 to AUH in business class as part of a few year relocation to the region for CCF and they will have several trips during their two year stay.

From what I understand, the Cleveland Clinic's operation of it's Abu Dhabi hospital is unique compared to other US based health organizations in the ME because CCF owns and operates the facility which generates direct CLE-AUH traffic as you were saying.

From what I've read about the Clinic's London site this hospital will cater to individuals with the means to use an alternative to the UK's NHS. So, just like with the Abu Dhabi facility, most administrators, doctors and patients who would require to fly from one location to another are going to fly J or F as opposed to Y.

Likewise, it looks like the Clinic is looking to get into a partnership with a Chinese hospital, although I don't think that facility will be owned by CCF.

It's fascinating how the Clinic is growing internationally while still expanding at an explosive rate in NE Ohio. The growth outside of the US is at it's infancy basically so the sky is the limit on this.

izbtmnhd wrote:

It's fascinating how the Clinic is growing internationally while still expanding at an explosive rate in NE Ohio. The growth outside of the US is at it's infancy basically so the sky is the limit on this.

The medical research and training that goes on under the Clinic's auspices probably generates almost as much travel as the healthcare end of things. From the viewpoint of the economy, it's much better when the Clinic starts something like their new undertaking Biobank rather than when they acquire a suburban hospital. I can't believe they haven't been talking to somebody about their London and Middle East travel needs.

Two new tenants coming to Concourse C:

La Boutique - January 2018 - https://www.instagram.com/p/Ba4ZU81hrs4/

Sides to Go BBQ - end of 2017 - https://www.instagram.com/p/BauKHkHBY_h/

I get CCF has, or is building, strong ties to some foreign cities, but realistically, how much traffic a day could that possibly generate? As a patient of CCF and a taxpayer in a region that grants them all kinds of tax breaks, I sure hope they really frown upon business class travel. Respectfully FUN2FLY, anecdote of a family 4 making a few trips per year, doesn't do it for me. They would need to be sending teams of consultants/doctors/etc. on a daily basis to attract an airline to London or AUH.

Cool on the new shops, I guess. I'm disappointed that t-shirt shop didn't make it as they had fantastic products. They were never open ahead of the 7AM departures on C, and that has to be a huge percentage of the day's traffic. These vendors will have to be wise about their operating hours.

Susan Glaser, noting the new CLE-MKE route, quotes a WN rep who hints at HOU and FLL for far-future route adds. Nothing said about Thursday, however. WN could probably elbow UA off CLE-FLL, but I think they'd have a harder time with B6 and NK. I suspect UA only keeps the seasonal Florida flights for utilization purposes and as mileage-burners to keep their frequent flyer base happy. B6 and NK, however, both have international hubs in FLL. I can think of a lot of places I'd rather see WN go.

http://www.cleveland.com/travel/index.s ... river_home

Sadly I thought that article pretty much said nothing.

FLL? Really? Just what we don’t seem to need. I wish I understood why after their AAhubs shut down STL and BNA grew WN beautifully, but CLE (and PIT for that matter) gets scraps after their hub closures. I suspect CLE too late to the party. CMH has better WN service than CLE last time I checked.

ncflyer wrote:

Sadly I thought that article pretty much said nothing.

I wish I understood why after their AAhubs shut down STL and BNA grew WN beautifully, but CLE (and PIT for that matter) gets scraps after their hub closures. I suspect CLE too late to the party.

WN's hard to figure. Typically they don't kill themselves reacting to what their competition does. Only twice have I noticed them jump at something: 1) DCA slots and 2) Wright Amendment limits lifted. If CLE gets another route or two on Thursday for next summer, I'd stay optimistic that they will continue to grow at CLE.

ncflyer wrote:

I get CCF has, or is building, strong ties to some foreign cities, but realistically, how much traffic a day could that possibly generate? As a patient of CCF and a taxpayer in a region that grants them all kinds of tax breaks, I sure hope they really frown upon business class travel. Respectfully FUN2FLY, anecdote of a family 4 making a few trips per year, doesn't do it for me. They would need to be sending teams of consultants/doctors/etc. on a daily basis to attract an airline to London or AUH.

Cool on the new shops, I guess. I'm disappointed that t-shirt shop didn't make it as they had fantastic products. They were never open ahead of the 7AM departures on C, and that has to be a huge percentage of the day's traffic. These vendors will have to be wise about their operating hours.

First, I'm sure more people are flying than just fun2fly's example. The Abu Dhabi hospital uses Clinic employees and the Cleveland Clinic name so there has to be a fair amount of travel.

Also, if every company/organization used your standards on tax breaks and flying J, NYC-LON would have a 0% LF up front.

I agree this international travel is nascent but the Clinic has 50k employees and shows know signs of slowing down and neither does their appetite to expand globally. The Abu Dhabi hospital has 3k employees and is doing well enough to expand more. The London hospital looks smaller but there aren't a lot of specifics as it's in the late planning stages. Very little info yet on China.

It's more than just employees that will fly. Well heeled patients will do TATL to see specialists as well. Hard to believe with steady expansion everywhere at some point it attracts some sort of service.

The money in Eds and Meds is on the Meds side which is why the Silicon Valley VC Plug-and-Play partnering with the Clinic chose Cleveland to start an incubator last week. That was amazing news. Their money was on a global search, not regional. Other investments went to the usual places like NYC, Tokyo and Abu Dhabi.

Hopefully this Plug and Play will keep CLE moving in the right direction, I share your optimism. I think the main reason we don't have service to LHR, CDG, FRA, and/or AMS, is because we're tied mainly to UA, which has showed such little to no willingness for transatlantic flights outside of their U.S. hubs. If we had stronger Delta or AA presence, I'm reasonably confident we would join PIT, IND, RDU, BNA, MSY, AUS, etc.

ncflyer wrote:

Hopefully this Plug and Play will keep CLE moving in the right direction, I share your optimism. I think the main reason we don't have service to LHR, CDG, FRA, and/or AMS, is because we're tied mainly to UA, which has showed such little to no willingness for transatlantic flights outside of their U.S. hubs. If we had stronger Delta or AA presence, I'm reasonably confident we would join PIT, IND, RDU, BNA, MSY, AUS, etc.

It will be interesting to see what affect WW and FI will have on CLE and possible TATL routes, and at this point, it is likely too early to tell.

As you mentioned out of the US3, UA is obviously the most likely and theoretically, UA can run connections through CLE on TATL flights, however, that advantage becomes smaller and smaller as UA continues to draw down p2p flights from CLE. Not only that, but UA is pretty traditional in their Hub-Spoke model unlike DL and to a lesser extent AA.

Ultimately I think the most likely scenario is DY/D8 or EI coming in with a flight to LGW or DUB, rather than UA, DL, BA, e.t.c adding TATL flights out of CLE.