After a two year absence, Spirit has won the right through the usual tedious political process to fly two daily roundtrips to Washington-National airport. It remains to be seen whether they will fly to Detroit or Ft. Lauderdale.National airport, the preferred close-in airport for Washington, DC, has two levels of service limits placed on it: flights cannot exceed 1250 miles (with a few specifically-granted exceptions) and the number of flights or “slots” is strictly controlled.The originally stated purpose of the 1250 mile limit, or “perimeter rule,” was to allow Washington-Dulles airport to build itself up as a base for long-haul flights. Ironically, by limiting the distance of flights at the close-in airport, National got more short flights and Dulles did not. So there wasn’t enough feeder traffic for long-haul flights, and the development of Dulles…
About Gary Leff
Deadline approaching
Tomorrow is the last day to register for the United Great Offer that gives bonus status miles just for faxing competitor frequent flyer statements to United. Only United elites (Premier, Premier Executive, 1K) are eligible.
Buying Magazines for International First Class Travel
Steve Belkin outlines the economics of buying large quantities of Inside Flyer magazine subscriptions as a way of acquiring discounted international premium class tickets. The essence of it is that Inside Flyer is offering lots of Diners Club points for subscribing, and this month Diner Club points transfer into twice the usual British Airways miles.I think Steve overstates the value somewhat when saying that a San Francisco-London First Class ticket will cost $2580 in Inside Flyer subscriptions compared to $13,600 according to Orbitz. Since these are frequent flyer awards, and capacity controlled, the more relevant price comparison is to consolidator tickets or at least deeply discounted first class tickets. But no matter — this is still a helluva deal!The key, though, is making sure that the Diners Club points show up in your account by…
Quote of the Day
Gene Healy says that conservatism means invading France and renaming it “Reagan.”
New America West Coast to Coast Service
America West is going to begin offering non-stop transcon flights from New York’s JFK to Los Angeles and San Francisco and from Boston to Los Angeles and San Francisco. I believe these will be the only flights that don’t originate or end at one of America West’s two hubs in Phoenix and Las Vegas.These are currently high revenue routes not served directly by discounters. JetBlue flights JFK to Oakland and Long Beach but not LA and San Francisco. America West will offer similar fares as JetBlue but into these primary (and higher operating cost) airports.This is bad news for the major carriers currently flying these routes, good news for consumers as the majors will likely be forced to match fares at least for flights at similar times, and an open question for America West’s bottom…
A new group that will oppose the TSA?
The TSA is placing electronic devices under greater scrutiny at airport security checkpoints, and techies are fuming.
Miles for Mortgages
I may be a bit behind the times, but there appears to me to be a new and more generous player in the miles for mortgages game. I saw an offer for Alaska Airlines miles this morning: 1300 miles (rather than 1000) for each $10000 in financing and 3000 miles per 10000 for buying/selling plus miles for moving, miles for using more than one service, and bonus miles for AS elites. Then I modified the URL to find the same offer with Delta, United, and Continental.
Free Software after Rebate
Amazon has Norton Internet Security 2003, SpyPC 7.0, and Enter the Matrix.
Cheaper Trains
I’ve just updated the post on Amtrak discounts.
Free Continental Silver extended
Get free trial Silver Elite on Continental from August 1st to October 15th. Sign up or call 1-800-346-6090 and use promotion code 54015.If you fly 3 qualifying round-trip flights: you get Silver Elite until February 2005. If you fly 6 qualifying round-trip flights: you get Gold Elite until February 2005. Only flights on Continental and Continental Express (not on partners like Northwest, Delta, Alaska, etc.) qualify, and then only on mid and high fares (not Q, S, T and L fares).They made this offer earlier this summer, and though it was targeted it seemed to work for everyone — at least anyone who called could get upgraded to silver instantly. Since I’m not signing up for this myself, I don’t yet know whether folks who didn’t receive the offer will be able to take advantage…
