Raleigh-New York the newest battleground route


United Airlines is apparently adding non-hub service between New York’s LaGuardia Airport and Raleigh-Durham starting with the winter season schedule this year; first flights are on 30 October 2016. The new service is loaded into the timetable and bookable now, though the company has not made a formal announcement that I’ve seen.

United's new Raleigh-New York service is available to buy today; flights start on 30 October 2016
United’s new Raleigh-New York service is available to buy today; flights start on 30 October 2016

United will be competing with both American Airlines (8x daily) and Delta (5x daily) on the route. And it offers zero connecting flow for United at either end. In that context it seems a strange route to add, both from a fleet utilization/routing perspective and a service demand perspective. But here we are.

Also unclear is where United is getting the slots to operate the service. A quick scan of the timetable shows 37 peak daily departures from LaGuardia for the company this summer:

  • ORD โ€“ 15
  • DEN โ€“ 6
  • IAH โ€“ 8
  • CLE โ€“ 6
  • IAD โ€“ 2

Looking at the winter schedule those frequencies all appear to still be intact. Something will have to give to add these three new flights, however. I’m betting it is ORD or CLE or some combination thereof. I could also see LGA-IAD service getting scrubbed completely.

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Seth Miller

I'm Seth, also known as the Wandering Aramean. I was bit by the travel bug 30 years ago and there's no sign of a cure. I fly ~200,000 miles annually; these are my stories. You can connect with me on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

18 Comments

    1. Yeah, but that’s a silly reason to do it. Especially when DL has some (though not a ton) of connectivity at both ends and UA has nil.

    2. Yeah, but a silly response IMO. It doesn’t really push at Delta in a meaningful way.

    1. Hehehe….clearly not gonna happen, but I struggle to see how this obviously retaliatory move makes sense. DL has a bit of feed at either end; UA is going on strictly O/D. There’s gotta be another anything UA could launch which would poke at Delta and have a better chance of financial success.

  1. They could’ve leased slots from other carriers right? Doesn’t VX have a few unused LGA slots?

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