Omaha Eppley Airfield - DISCUSSION

[Mr.Nuke]

March up 16.2%, up 18.2% YTD.
https://www.flyoma.com/wp-content/uploa ... istics.pdf

[jjjjhskr]

March up 16.2%, up 18.2% YTD.
https://www.flyoma.com/wp-content/uploa ... istics.pdf

The huge jump by United is nice to see. I remember when they were to dominant carrier at OMA.

[damonhynes]

March up 16.2%, up 18.2% YTD.
https://www.flyoma.com/wp-content/uploa ... istics.pdf

The huge jump by United is nice to see. I remember when they were the dominant carrier at OMA.

Any other time, American's +106% mainline +11% overall would have been fantastic. Mainline to CLT and ORD is nice.

Delta looks grim. I've read on some aviation boards that they're aiming toward high-end spenders, left unsaid is that maybe there aren't any in the OMA metro...

[jjjjhskr]

March up 16.2%, up 18.2% YTD.
https://www.flyoma.com/wp-content/uploa ... istics.pdf

I would think that’s good for Eppley since Omaha has more business than leisure travelers. Business travelers tend to pay higher prices.

The huge jump by United is nice to see. I remember when they were the dominant carrier at OMA.

Any other time, American's +106% mainline +11% overall would have been fantastic. Mainline to CLT and ORD is nice.

Delta looks grim. I've read on some aviation boards that they're aiming toward high-end spenders, left unsaid is that maybe there aren't any in the OMA metro...

[TitosBuritoBarn]

Delta looks grim. I've read on some aviation boards that they're aiming toward high-end spenders, left unsaid is that maybe there aren't any in the OMA metro...

Mmmm. Makes sense. Nothing pleases high-end spenders more than connecting through Atlanta no matter where they're trying to go.

[damonhynes]

Delta looks grim. I've read on some aviation boards that they're aiming toward high-end spenders, left unsaid is that maybe there aren't any in the OMA metro...

Mmmm. Makes sense. Nothing pleases high-end spenders more than connecting through Atlanta no matter where they're trying to go.

Heh. Well, I like ATL, I've never been stabbed there, just a couple close connections.

[Bob from Omaha]

March up 16.2%, up 18.2% YTD.
https://www.flyoma.com/wp-content/uploa ... istics.pdf

Pax up 16.2% while carrier ops up 1.6%

[ProgKingHughesker]

Delta looks grim. I've read on some aviation boards that they're aiming toward high-end spenders, left unsaid is that maybe there aren't any in the OMA metro...

Mmmm. Makes sense. Nothing pleases high-end spenders more than connecting through Atlanta no matter where they're trying to go.

Heh. Well, I like ATL, I've never been stabbed there, just a couple close connections.

Doesn't matter what part of town it's in, there is pretty much no safer place the average civilian will ever be that is safer than airside at a major airport.

[Louie]

Delta looks grim. I've read on some aviation boards that they're aiming toward high-end spenders, left unsaid is that maybe there aren't any in the OMA metro...

Mmmm. Makes sense. Nothing pleases high-end spenders more than connecting through Atlanta no matter where they're trying to go.

Heh. Well, I like ATL, I've never been stabbed there, just a couple close connections.

I think he was referring to the lack of convenience, not the safety or quality of the ATL airport.

[TitosBuritoBarn]

Delta looks grim. I've read on some aviation boards that they're aiming toward high-end spenders, left unsaid is that maybe there aren't any in the OMA metro...

Mmmm. Makes sense. Nothing pleases high-end spenders more than connecting through Atlanta no matter where they're trying to go.

Heh. Well, I like ATL, I've never been stabbed there, just a couple close connections.

I think he was referring to the lack of convenience, not the safety or quality of the ATL airport.

Yeah, it was a joke about no matter where you want to travel to or where you are coming from, Delta always wants to connect you through Atlanta. That being the primary reason why it’s the busiest airport in the world. Personally I once flew to Calgary from St. Louis and they connected me through Atlanta. Another time I was flying to St. Louis from Zurich. After first flying into JFK I was again made to connect through Atlanta.

But don’t take my word for it:

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskAnAmerican/ ... g_through/

[damonhynes]

I actually meant missing a connection :-) And since I don't fly Spirit, I don't have to be worried about literally being stabbed...

[Bob from Omaha]

I actually meant missing a connection :-) And since I don't fly Spirit, I don't have to be worried about literally being stabbed...

When I've flown Spirit I've never had a problem. On time if not early arrival, clean plane, unbelievably cheap fares. I'm about 6'1" and haven't had my knees touch the seat in front of me. In over 100 flights I've been very satisfied.

[damonhynes]

I actually meant missing a connection :-) And since I don't fly Spirit, I don't have to be worried about literally being stabbed...

When I've flown Spirit I've never had a problem. On time if not early arrival, clean plane, unbelievably cheap fares. I'm about 6'1" and haven't had my knees touch the seat in front of me. In over 100 flights I've been very satisfied.

Aw, I'm not one to let a good urban legend go to waste :-) I'd suspect that flying Spirit to/from Florida might be a different experience than say, Houston or Phoenix, but that's more down to it being Florida.

[Bob from Omaha]

I'm assuming it was a charter but Breeze Airways had a flight from Provo Utah to Omaha on April 20th and a return to Provo on the 23rd. If it was new service they need to tell people.

[thenewguy]

on Easter Sunday, we saw a Qatar airlines plane fly overhead in an easterly direction (says 'QATAR' on the belly of the aircraft). Not sure why they were at Eppley but I've never seen on before or since.

[SunMan]

The Qatar plane flew horses here for the World Equestrian event.

[Mjs5050ss]

on Easter Sunday, we saw a Qatar airlines plane fly overhead in an easterly direction (says 'QATAR' on the belly of the aircraft). Not sure why they were at Eppley but I've never seen on before or since.

[Bob from Omaha]

I was just thinking about the new Lincoln service. Nuke says it's a hail mary but how is it that different from DSM's Allegiant service? A couple of times a week to fun destinations. The more I think about it the more I like the creative thinking.

[Mr.Nuke]

I was just thinking about the new Lincoln service. Nuke says it's a hail mary but how is it that different from DSM's Allegiant service? A couple of times a week to fun destinations. The more I think about it the more I like the creative thinking.

The only major similarities are that they're both flying to places on non-daily schedules and each essentially has a crew base. Allegiant is an established airline that has been doing it for years. The Lincoln operation is essentially a charter operator trying to be an airline for the first time. I don't have a clue what they are doing for gates/counter space at the outstations. Most of the DSM routes have some sort of plausibility in looking at PDEW numbers from before they were launched. The same cannot be said for Lincoln. Des Moines is also a metro about double the size of Lincoln with a naturally wider catchment area. If any of those Lincoln routes were to take off especially the ones not served by Omaha daily I wouldn't be surprised if someone like Southwest responded out of Eppley.

Lastly, for all of the talk about Allegiant, they're still a fairly small part of the overall traffic in Des Moines. They're talking market share at a decent rate but they only had 19% of the passengers in 2022 and only 14% in 2001. This new airline in Lincoln is looking to effectively double the seats in Lincoln on a given day. On 3/31, a Friday, United had 402 seats out of Lincoln, this new airline is scheduling 450 themself on a Friday. You are essentially trying to fill 112% more seats all of the sudden out of nowhere on an airline that doesn't offer connections, likely won't be on booking sites like kayak, travelocity, google flights, etc.

[Bob from Omaha]

Let's chat about your post.

Allegiant has the second largest pax percentage at DSM through March of this year at 22%. Fairly small?
What is/was the PDEW for DSM-Palm Springs CA? How about the others?

As for Lincoln, What info do you have regarding the choice of destinations for the new airline from Lincoln? Are you alleging that LNK and their airline partner did zero research prior to the announcement?

What does it matter what the gates/counter space situation is at the outstations? Are you saying that this as well hasn't been thought out or planned? I have no information as to the planning but I'd guess that at the very least a couple of phone calls were made.

Lastly, with regard to filling seats "all of a sudden, out of nowhere", I'd posit that the fares are cheap and the chosen destinations are mostly leisure. I'd say there is a demand for them.

[jjjjhskr]

As usual lots of extra flights at Epply due to Berkshire Hathaway. Includes United flights from Newark, hope they make it permanent again.

[Bearcat06]

Sun Country routes to MSP starting soon.

Picked a random week, Jun 23rd to fly out, Jun 26th to fly back, as a test. Came in at $108/pp RT...not terrible. Not sure what that comes with, i.e. are carry-ons extra, etc. And your stuck flying Fridays or Mondays, but Delta on the same days the cheapest RT is $408 in main.

[Bearcat06]

I knew LNK had lost Delta, but I didn't realize they were down to just United and 3 routes with them. Woof!

I realize the new carrier/charters, but I know that's been discussed here already. Can't imagine that increasing their pax load consistently.

[Louie]

I knew LNK had lost Delta, but I didn't realize they were down to just United and 3 routes with them. Woof!

I realize the new carrier/charters, but I know that's been discussed here already. Can't imagine that increasing their pax load consistently.

There are only 10 destinations from LNK?

[Mr.Nuke]

I knew LNK had lost Delta, but I didn't realize they were down to just United and 3 routes with them. Woof!

I realize the new carrier/charters, but I know that's been discussed here already. Can't imagine that increasing their pax load consistently.

There are only 10 destinations from LNK?

I mean technically as of today there are only 3 and all on one airline. This new airline gets them to 10.

[Bob from Omaha]

I'm on the record as thinking that LNK should close and its traffic should move to Eppley to enhance demand. Failing that I'm also on the record as saying that this is out of the box thinking as they haven't had any luck increasing traditional service.
I give them credit for doing something.

Eppley does zero advertising on a regular basis, it doesn't appear to be very aggressive in seeking new destinations and frequencies and I'll bet you everything in my pocket to everything in your pocket that the terminal modernization project ends up being bland as opposed to OKC.

[TransitOriented]

I'm on the record as thinking that LNK should close and its traffic should move to Eppley to enhance demand.

As long as there is regular bus service for the people of Lincoln to get to Eppley (which is better than what the people of Omaha have). So maybe a bus that stops at Eppley, Westroads, Gretna, and 2 stops in Lincoln? Run that thing hourly or 90 mins.

[Bob from Omaha]

I'm on the record as thinking that LNK should close and its traffic should move to Eppley to enhance demand.

As long as there is regular bus service for the people of Lincoln to get to Eppley (which is better than what the people of Omaha have). So maybe a bus that stops at Eppley, Westroads, Gretna, and 2 stops in Lincoln? Run that thing hourly or 90 mins.

LNK will always strive for airline service. There is an element that wants it and I seriously doubt that whoever has the authority to stop trying and close the airport would be able to do it. Here in Michigan Ann Arbor has an airport but I don't think it has commercial service. It's much closer to Detroit Metro Airport and its 600 flights a day that Lincoln is to Eppley and its, well, less than 600 flights.

[Mr.Nuke]

April up 9.6% for the month and 15.8% YTD
https://www.flyoma.com/wp-content/uploa ... istics.pdf

[joleo]

April up 9.6% for the month and 15.8% YTD
https://www.flyoma.com/wp-content/uploa ... istics.pdf

It's interesting the north terminal is now handling 60% of the traffic and south terminal only 40% with southwest and united both growing significantly. The north terminal is crowded several times I've been there.

Allegiant has their ticket counter already in the south terminal but uses the north terminal gates. I feel like Eppley should move them back to the south terminal. A pretty cheap move and way better for the Allegiant passenger experience, avoiding the walking back and forth.

[Mr.Nuke]

Allegiant has their ticket counter already in the south terminal but uses the north terminal gates. I feel like Eppley should move them back to the south terminal. A pretty cheap move and way better for the Allegiant passenger experience, avoiding the walking back and forth.

There are also entire days (it appears today might be one of them) where Allegiant doesn't fly here at all meaning they're not contributing to any congestion at all (heck they've got the Fall period where they historically don't come here for weeks at a time). There are currently no open gates in the South terminal so 1) you'd have to swap with someone and 2) Sun Country in all likelihood is going to operate out of the North concourse as well.

As it stands, Allegiant averaged about 500 passengers a day for the month or about 250 going through security each day. They're not contributing much to any congestion in that concourse. Sure you could flip Frontier or Alaska and theoretically get more balanced, but are you going to flip them back if say American decides to add capacity or United pulls it? Obviously it should hopefully become a moot point soon with a centralized single concourse.

[joleo]

I guess I haven't been in the south terminal for many years (always fly United or Southwest) but I have a hard time believing all the gate space in the south terminal is full? American, Delta, Alaska and Frontier. Frontier only has a couple flights a week these days, Alaska flights leave in the afternoon, seem like plenty of space down there.

In the north terminal, United really uses 2 gates and only at 6am they use all 4 of their gates but they really don't need to, they only do because they can without having to tow from a remote stand. Southwest uses 3 gates and has 36% of the airport's traffic. I get it, they use bigger planes.

Maybe Eppley should go to common use gates in the new terminal like Des Moines and many airports do so that different airlines can use the same gate. For example, my last flight from Des Moines had a United flight, then an American flight then an allegiant flight all leaving from the same gate about 60 minutes apart from each other.

Yes, Allegiant has no flights today but they average about 14 a week right now so some days are 4 flights per day or more and they are all full size planes holding 150 people or more, it does make a difference for sure when Allegiant flights are leaving on the North terminal being crowded.

Seems like for the time being, Alaska, Frontier and Allegiant could all just share 3 gates. That leaves 7 for AA/ DL which should be more then plenty and can use one of the Alaska/Frontier/ Allegiant gates if they need to when not being used. None of those 3 airlines overnight any planes in Omaha.

[Bob from Omaha]

American, United and Delta appear to have moved quite a few flights to mainline.

On the other hand, absent Allegiant when is the last time Southwest, American, Delta or United added a destination? And don't tell me it's not happening these days. Other airports are adding service often.

[Uffda]

I flew in last Thursday and happened to have a window seat. Looking out at the airport, I thought it looked nice and modern —- then I realized that was the garage addition.

I like the rental car area that is a huge improvement over the off site. Reminds of TPA’s new rental car area.

[Bob from Omaha]

I've messaged OMA on its facebook messenger page regarding an update on timing of terminal modernization project. In the past they've responded within a day or two. Regarding my recent message I've heard nothing. As a quasi public entity a certain amount of transparency would be expected.

[Mr.Nuke]

I guess I haven't been in the south terminal for many years (always fly United or Southwest) but I have a hard time believing all the gate space in the south terminal is full?

They are all presently leased. Frontier has A1, Delta A2-A5, American A6, A7, A8, and A10, and Alaska A9.

American, Delta, Alaska and Frontier. Frontier only has a couple flights a week these days, Alaska flights leave in the afternoon, seem like plenty of space down there.

Leasing has nothing to do with utilization. The airport is presumably collecting the same gate lease fee for the space from Frontier and Alaska as they are from Delta.

In the north terminal, United really uses 2 gates and only at 6am they use all 4 of their gates but they really don't need to, they only do because they can without having to tow from a remote stand. Southwest uses 3 gates and has 36% of the airport's traffic. I get it, they use bigger planes.

United has B11-14, Southwest B16-B18, Allegiant B19, B20 is vacant, and B15 will be used by Sun Country. Again though with a vacant gate why should the airport care that United is willing to rent 2 extra gates for their morning departures? It is rental income for the airport.

Maybe Eppley should go to common use gates in the new terminal like Des Moines and many airports do so that different airlines can use the same gate. For example, my last flight from Des Moines had a United flight, then an American flight then an allegiant flight all leaving from the same gate about 60 minutes apart from each other.

They might in a central terminal design, but as it stands now with low gate utilization, an gate to spare, and a split terminal design it really doesn't solve anything. Everyone has their own dedicated branded gates with their own dedicated computer equipment, and their own dedicated ground equipment set up in the appropriate spot to service their planes.

The airport also benefits from the current system, because as you note, despite having only 2 unoccupied gates (soon to be one) Many of the "occupied" gates get used seldomly. Nevertheless, the airport again is still collecting income on them. A common use Eppley doesn't need 20 gates right now and could get by with much fewer during most parts of the day. Additionally, The larger operators like Southwest would probably be against common use to as it shifts more of the costs to them. They may have to go to common use during terminal construction as undoubtedly various gates are going to be unavailable at different points.

Yes, Allegiant has no flights today but they average about 14 a week right now so some days are 4 flights per day or more and they are all full size planes holding 150 people or more, it does make a difference for sure when Allegiant flights are leaving on the North terminal being crowded.

I just have a very hard time believing that 248 departing passengers a day per month on average are causing a significant issue in the North concourse. To accurately see what is going on and If A) there is a crowding issue and B) what you could potentially do to solve it...

The monthly passenger totals and the terminal breakdown really don't mean much unless it become highly imbalanced. 58/42% is more unbalanced than it has historically been, but that still isn't all that tilted (yet at least). You really would need to be able to access the TSA wait times (which we can to an extent), departure times (which we can), and terminal passenger hold counts (which we can't but you could extrapolate). The monthly numbers matter a lot less than what is happening on an hourly basis that may be causing choke points.

I.e. As of noon right now Southwest has 3 flights scheduled to depart within an hour and two within 30 minutes of each other. I have a feeling their gate area is quite crowded. That has nothing to do with Allegiant or United as United doesn't have anything until 2:11. After this bank of SW departures, between 1:15 and 2:05 the next 5 departures are all from the South concourse. I have a feeling it is getting crowded there right now. Both concourses are going to be crowded in the 5:30 to 7:00 a.m. range as everyone's overnight planes are departing. The 58/42 doesn't tell me much in of itself.

Seems like for the time being, Alaska, Frontier and Allegiant could all just share 3 gates. That leaves 7 for AA/ DL which should be more then plenty and can use one of the Alaska/Frontier/ Allegiant gates if they need to when not being used. None of those 3 airlines overnight any planes in Omaha.

Again I don't know that it solves anything (if anything needs to be solved to begin with). The 3 all have their own non shared gate right now. And why should Delta or American be forced to vacate a gate they're paying for?

Edit: The other factor is some of the near term discrepancy between terminals probably gets worked out to an extent here shortly. From my look at a random day's schedule from March to June both American and Delta were adding seats while United and Southwest were contracting.
https://www.eomahaforums.com/viewtopic. ... 10#p368310

[Mr.Nuke]

American, United and Delta appear to have moved quite a few flights to mainline.

On the other hand, absent Allegiant when is the last time Southwest, American, Delta or United added a destination?

Those two things are quite inter-related in the grand scheme of things.

And don't tell me it's not happening these days. Other airports are adding service often.

Okay, but overall it is the opposite direction.

United is pulling out of 2 more US cities, bringing pandemic-era total to 38 market exits
https://thepointsguy.com/news/united-ai ... us-cities/

[Bob from Omaha]

And don't tell me it's not happening these days. Other airports are adding service often.

Okay, but overall it is the opposite direction.

United is pulling out of 2 more US cities, bringing pandemic-era total to 38 market exits
https://thepointsguy.com/news/united-ai ... us-cities/

Apples and oranges somewhat. Take a look at the story and pay attention to the list of cities UAL dropped. Every one is a very small market.

I'm looking for service to EWR, for example. It's a gateway. I could list more but the point is that while numbers for this year are encouraging and the trend is up there hasn't been additional service added by the major carriers. I'd say why isn't Jetblue serving OMA but a cursory look at their load factor from MCI leads me to believe that maybe it isn't worth it. On the other hand, MCI already has service to BOS and JFK via Delta.

[Bob from Omaha]

I was just thinking about the new Lincoln service. Nuke says it's a hail mary but how is it that different from DSM's Allegiant service? A couple of times a week to fun destinations. The more I think about it the more I like the creative thinking.

The only major similarities are that they're both flying to places on non-daily schedules and each essentially has a crew base. Allegiant is an established airline that has been doing it for years. The Lincoln operation is essentially a charter operator trying to be an airline for the first time. I don't have a clue what they are doing for gates/counter space at the outstations. Most of the DSM routes have some sort of plausibility in looking at PDEW numbers from before they were launched. The same cannot be said for Lincoln. Des Moines is also a metro about double the size of Lincoln with a naturally wider catchment area. If any of those Lincoln routes were to take off especially the ones not served by Omaha daily I wouldn't be surprised if someone like Southwest responded out of Eppley.

Lastly, for all of the talk about Allegiant, they're still a fairly small part of the overall traffic in Des Moines. They're talking market share at a decent rate but they only had 19% of the passengers in 2022 and only 14% in 2001. This new airline in Lincoln is looking to effectively double the seats in Lincoln on a given day. On 3/31, a Friday, United had 402 seats out of Lincoln, this new airline is scheduling 450 themself on a Friday. You are essentially trying to fill 112% more seats all of the sudden out of nowhere on an airline that doesn't offer connections, likely won't be on booking sites like kayak, travelocity, google flights, etc.

Well, the new airline with the all of a sudden out of nowhere schedule says they've sold 5,000 seats and extended their schedule.
____________________________________________________________________________
"Demand for tickets for a startup airline that will begin service to Lincoln next month has been so strong that the company has already decided to extend its schedule.

Much of the service provided by Red Way is intended to be seasonal, with only a couple of the airline's seven destinations likely to have year-round flights.

But Red Way announced Wednesday that it plans to provide twice-a-week service to all seven cities through at least Nov. 29 "to accommodate the growing demand from the local community."

Rachel Barth, the airport's director of communications and customer engagement, said more than 5,000 tickets have been sold so far."
____________________________________________________________________________

Here's the thing. The entire enterprise is a colaberation between the airport, the charter company and the airport's consultant. It's not just an airline coming to LNK. They are free to change anything. They can add, subtract or change service as they see fit. I'm thinking this is brilliant. They are already adapting. 5,000 tickets this quick is a good sign.

[Mr.Nuke]

I want to respond to a couple of other of your posts this weekend if I have time that require a bit more digging for information, but this one is fairly easy to respond to. The entire "article" is a PR piece that masquerades as trying to inform you, but really doesn't tell anything.

Well, the new airline with the all of a sudden out of nowhere schedule says they've sold 5,000 seats

Over what period of time? United had nearly 19,500 passengers out of Lincoln for the month of March. These guy's planes are going to have ~150-180 seats. For starting service next month, and again without knowing the context of the time period for the 5,000 (guessing given they didn't given a time period, it is probably total sold) 5,000 doesn't seem that impressive. The ill-fated Omaha-Toronto Air Canada service had nearly 2,000 passengers in its first month of operation.

and extended their schedule.
"Demand for tickets for a startup airline that will begin service to Lincoln next month has been so strong that the company has already decided to extend its schedule.

This was never in doubt as long as the subsidy exists.

Here's the thing. The entire enterprise is a collaboration between the airport, the charter company and the airport's consultant. It's not just an airline coming to LNK. They are free to change anything. They can add, subtract or change service as they see fit.

The charter company is effectively operating as an airline here. There are costs to changing things. They're still going to need gates, ticket counters, and ground handling at the airports they operate out of outside of Lincoln. Some of that is trivial to change some of it isn't. They're still going to need advanced bookings to fill planes. That isn't trivial.