All-Purpose Airline/Aviation Thread

[Scrabbleship]

AirTran regulars are hot and cold on the merger. Let's say there are a lot of people who fit into either (or both) of the following who are not happy with this news:
1: People who like that Airtran has assigned seating (though for all but a center seat you have to pay a fee to reserve) and a Business class section (with cheap upgrades) and that both bring some civility vs. other LCC's. 
2: People who have never flown Southwest and buy into all the stereotypes of "cattle-call" boarding and goofy flight attendants and liken it to "a Greyhound Bus in the sky".
And some people have concern over two other things.
3: Airtran has Wifi on all flights while Southwest is starting a slow rollout of Wifi to not be completed until 2010. At the same time, Airtran's system is land-based while Southwest's will be satellite-based.
4: Fears that Southwest will ditch the Sirius XM radio at every seat which is very nice to have even on a shorter length flight.

AirTran is a good airline, however as I've flown Southwest and jetBlue more I see them more as a mini-legacy with cheaper fares than their peers. The checked bag fees, scant snack/drink service, and the tight seating pitch in coach all remind me more of, say, Delta than Southwest. A Coke Zero and a tiny bag of pretzels for a 2-hour BWI-MKE flight vs. 2 cups of coffee, a water, and 2 bags of peanuts for a 1:10 BWI-ALB flight, which looks better?

[WMATAGMOAGH]

The SWA boarding procedure IS a cattle call as far as I'm concerned.  I'll admit it has gotten better over time, since they've gone from the huge groups to having everyone line up in order, but I find it stressful and inconvenient.  I'd rather just book a seat in advance, possibly even pay for the privledge of buying a certain seat in advance (as a fairly tall guy who finds plane seats to be uncomfortable, I'm willing to pay for that up until a point), and the knowledge I'm going to get an aisle before showing up at the airport. 

I've flown many airlines in many different countries and I'm pretty sure I've seen every boarding scheme imaginable.  SWA and EasyJet, both of whom use open seating, are my least favorite, without question (even though I managed to get aisles at the front of both EasyJet flights I took without paying for the privilege of pre-boarding).

[Scrabbleship]

I've flown many airlines in many different countries and I'm pretty sure I've seen every boarding scheme imaginable.  SWA and EasyJet, both of whom use open seating, are my least favorite, without question (even though I managed to get aisles at the front of both EasyJet flights I took without paying for the privilege of pre-boarding).

In terms of boarding process at the gate, I'd take Southwest's system of places in line to be a lot more orderly than the zones of the legacies and Airtran. Everytime I've boarded a legacy, there is the inevitable pack of Zone 3/4 people congregating right as they board First Class/Elites and so on down the line. The assigned place in line system is a lot more orderly and Southwest's gate areas look a lot less messy, IMO. A good balance is what jetBlue does in boarding the rear-most rows first and working their way to the front.

The whole "check in as close to 24 hours before your flight as possible" game on Southwest, in all honesty, grew on me after a while and I found that I could still land an aisle seat with a boarding position well into the B's and a checkin time many hours later.

[WMATAGMOAGH]

Again, I've seen it all in terms of ways to board a plane, and it doesn't matter what system is used.  A study actually showed that an El Al style free for all (my LY flight from JFK to TLV had preboarding followed immediately by ALL ROWS and this was for a sold out 747) is faster than boarding the plane back to front, and I'd say in my undocumented observations, that the El Al style free for all certainly doesn't seem to take any longer than a more orderly system.  The best system as shown by the aforementioned study is described here:  http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/WhosCounting/story?id=6562852&page=1. 

I didn't realize last time I flew SWA I could check in and then "lose" my boarding pass and just get it at the airport, I could have been in the first group easily otherwise.  But you get what you pay for.  I like having a seat assignment.

[btconet]

I tend to agree with Oren that there's a certain amount of serenity to knowing where you'll sit the instant you book that ticket.

Travelling, particularly by air, is an anxious experience in that you have TSA regs to worry with, weather disruptions that can leave you stranded at a connection point, as well as the anxiety of hoping your booking at a distant destination didn't get fouled up.  The whole thing of "first come first serve" at T-24 hours is annoying, while the upcharge to "earlybird" is more annoying to me (I'd rather pay Airtran $6 to pick a seat at booking than to pay SW $10 to get front of plane privlege).  And inevitably, even if you get an "A" pass, there's always someone who, honestly or not, somehow doesn't understand the letter prefix and clips their B42 in front of your A43.

That said, it is better than the days of the simple A/B/C alone passes, where the "B" pass could mean "aisle-window in middle" or "middle seat" depending on if you wanted to sit on the floor at the front of the B zone 60 minutes before boarding or not!

The differences between airlines in coach are becoming so moot now that price is the only object.  I used to be willing to pay a bit more to ride CO since they fed you, assigned seats, and offered free check baggage for card holders.  I used to like AT for their low late fares and the ability to buy a seat or pick it at check in.  Now, it seems there will only be SW with open seating and free bags, and other carriers with assigned seating and paid check bags.  Even the CO meal vanishes on October 12th.

[WMATAGMOAGH]

Adam,

You hit it on the nose I think.  I find flying to be extremely stressful, why add in the uncertainty of whether I'll get an aisle seat or not, especially for a long flight (though the last flight I took, JFK-TLV 5 weeks ago, I had a middle seat on the side of a 747, 3-4-3 layout, because I bought the ticket a week before flying, and fortunately, I had no problems despite the length of the flight)? 

I still am loyal to certain airlines.  I try to fly Star Alliance partners when I can so I can get my miles in one place and then upgrade or get free travel.  I will pay more for a direct flight or to minimize layovers, again, it reduces the chance of having something go wrong as a result of a connection.  SWA might be low cost and no frill, and that is fine with me.  I don't have to buy their tickets or fly with them however, and generally choose not to.

CO was still offering domestic meal service?  When I flew USAirways DCA-CLT-GIG back in July, I called the airline to request a Kosher meal, and when I got to an agent and said I was calling to request a meal, it sounded like she had not heard that question in a long time.  She immediately asked where I was flying to, and once I said Rio de Janeiro, was quite helpful in getting me to the proper department to make my request.