Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky Airport

Delta’s new push to Paris confronts United and shows commitment to SkyTeam amid alliance shifts

Major shifts in the three major global airline alliances during the last few weeks have triggered a bevy questions regarding the future of those tie-ups. But just as Qantas attempts to forge a broad agreement with unaligned Emriates, British Airways has convinced reluctant members to allow Qatar to join oneworld and Air France has reversed its stance to embrace Etihad and airberlin, SkyTeam partners Delta and Air France are bolstering their presence in the US-France market.

It is not clear if Delta could benefit from the new Air France-Etihad tie-up that entails codesharing on flights to Abu Dhabi, but eventually Delta’s connecting customers in Paris could utlilise connections to the Middle East opened up by the new non-SkyTeam partnership.

Beginning in the northern hemisphere summer of 2013, Delta is introducing new flights from Newark Liberty International Airport to Paris Charles de Gaulle, and new seasonal flights from Boston to Paris. Delta also plans to add another daily flight from its Atlanta hub to Paris, which will increase to four the combined number of daily services offered by Delta and Air France on the pairing.

Delta leverages its strength in Seattle and Alaska Airlines partnership to bolster service to Asia

Delta Air Lines aims to leverage its strong position in Seattle and the long-standing relationship the carrier has built with Alaska Airlines to expand its offerings to Asia. Through the expansion, Delta could intensify competition from the US west coast to Asia with United, which has recorded some sluggishness in its Asian performance during the last year. If Delta succeeds in launching proposed new services to Shanghai and Tokyo’s Haneda airport, Seattle will join the airline’s Detroit hub in becoming a major Asian gateway for the carrier.

If the requisite regulatory approvals for seven weekly frequencies are awarded, Delta intends to launch new service between Seattle and Shanghai in Jun-2013. The carrier is also seeking approval to launch flights between Seattle and Tokyo Haneda. Delta already serves Seattle from Tokyo Narita. Delta is seeking approvals to transfer to the Seattle-Haneda route the traffic rights and Haneda slot it had used for its Detroit-Haneda service, which it axed on 30-Sep-2012 after declaring that the route was underperforming. But American, Hawaiian and United have also all applied to use the Haneda slot originally awarded to Delta for Detroit-Haneda service.

Delta’s latest cuts inch Memphis closer in size to downgraded Cincinnati hub

A continued pare-down by Delta Air Lines of its Memphis hub that includes the elimination of approximately 56 weekly frequencies and three route cuts beginning in Aug-2012 will result in Memphis having a similar size in Delta’s network as the carrier’s Cincinnati hub, which has become increasingly marginalised since the 2008 merger of Delta and Northwest Airlines.

The latest pruning in Memphis by Delta should result in a decrease to approximately 125 daily departures by the carrier from the airport, down from a peak of approximately 300 in 2000, or a reduction of nearly 42%. As of Jul-2012 Delta estimated it offered 147 peak day departures from its Memphis hub.

From Cincinnati to Memphis: high fares and diminished service for smaller US hubs

In our analysis of airports across the US over the past year, we have observed the decline of three previous hubs – Cincinnati, Pittsburgh and St Louis – and the dramatic changes that have accompanied their loss of status. Given its precarious location amidst other Delta Air Lines hubs, we speculated that Memphis could meet a similar fate. Delta this week announced that it will introduce further cutbacks from 04-Jan-2012 when it plans to drop seven more destinations and 15 flights. In this group is Seattle, leaving only Los Angeles with non-stop service on the west coast. Mainline Delta service is an ever-more endangered species.

FedEx cargo props up Memphis airport, but Delta cuts lower passenger traffic

In our examination of US hubs, Memphis stood out as its geography makes it vulnerable to being downsized. The latest announcements from Delta make that outcome more plausible.

Delta announces 25% reduction in operations at Memphis

In Apr-2010 while profiling US hubs, CAPA looked at Delta’s hub in Memphis (MEM). At that time we speculated that Memphis as a hub was vulnerable if reductions were to be made. Yesterday, Delta announced a 25% reduction in operations at MEM.