Southwest is buying AirTran!

[Fire14]

I personally am loving it. I play TA for Disney Travel bud a lot and just recently booked her flight on airtran and mine on SW. her flights times have changed twice in month I've had them booked, only thing that has changed for my SW flight is price. I personally hope this means I can get her on SWA flights from a closer to her home airport.

 

[Cindy's Mom]

I'm hoping that Southwest will get AirTran's spots at O'Hare (Currently SWA only flies out of Midway).

I only fly SW to Florida and I live very close O'Hare.

 

[richmo]

This definitely should be interesting. For those of us in PHL, a few interesting things:

- An earlier post said that AirTran was the only competition for Southwest for the PHL-MCO route. AirTran may have been the only lower cost competitor, but US Airways has several nonstops to MCO, maybe more than AirTran and Southwest combined.
- AirTran flies out of ABE to MCO. I've been hoping Southwest would expand to Lehigh Valley, and perhaps this is the way. If nothing else, the addition of ABE may take a little pressure off flights out of PHL. (And Southwest's expansion to EWR might help some as well).
- For a time, AirTran also flew out of Atlantic City direct to MCO. I think AirTran still has a presence in ACY, but now they may just fly to ATL directly. If Southwest keeps ACY and phases out AirTran's hub in ATL, maybe we'll see some competition for Spirit in ACY.

 

[Free4Life11]

Agreed. I have no desire to be herded onto a SW plane. I love Airtran. THeir policies and customer service are top notch. Their prices are fabulous from MSP. This is really going to mess things up around here. Grrrr.

Everyone is entitled to their opinion and I too used to dislike the "herding" onto the plane, but I've recently flown Southwest a few times and their boarding process has really improved IMO. Honestly, it's so much faster and efficient than any other airline I've flown.

I really like Southwest and like that this will expand their service to a lot of markets!

 

[Jennasis]

Yay! Hoping this means my parents will be able to fly from Islip, NY direct to Charlotte now when they visit!

 

[Hannathy]

I'm hoping that Southwest will get AirTran's spots at O'Hare (Currently SWA only flies out of Midway).

I only fly SW to Florida and I live very close O'Hare.

this is the only possible good news to come out of this. But if the price goes up due to lack of competition will it matter?

 

[klacey1]

Our local airport currently only has Delta, Jet Blue, and AirTran. Southwest will still have to compete with JetBlue (no baggage fees, fairly low-cost), so I think we'll be okay. I hope they force JetBlue's prices down and we'll fly with JB!

 

[MarkBarbieri]

I have never flown Southwest, as AirTran has always had the lowest prices out of Philly. But I keep hearing good things about Southwest on the DIS, so I suppose we'll have to wait and see. It might be a long time before any changes are seen at all.

I can give you a counterpoint. I loathe flying Southwest. I've flown on many airlines at many times. I hate the lack of reserved seating. I have had bad experiences with customer service. Despite Southwest accounting for only about 10% of my flights, I've had about 75% of my bad passenger experiences (usually loud, foul-mouth drunks) on Southwest. I know that people love them, but I can't figure out why.

 

[MarkBarbieri]

On the plus side, Airtran/ValueJet had a pretty poor safety record, so maybe its better that someone else owns them now.

 

[PlainJane]

Reasons why I don't like this:
1. I don't like being herded.
2. I'll miss the inexpensive upgrades to first class.
3. Lack of competition means higher prices, great.
4. AirTran was almost always cheaper for us, I think one time that wasn't the case, and for the price difference we could normally fly first class on AirTran.
5. There will be less flights overall now.

I've never understood the infatuation with SW. I'm glad I don't fly that often. Driving becomes more appealing every day.

 

[disfan07]

I dont see this as a bad thing. But I also think that airtran is terrible. We have never had a good experience with them. We are loyal SWA customers all the way.

 

[snykymom]

I dont see this as a bad thing. But I also think that airtran is terrible. We have never had a good experience with them. We are loyal SWA customers all the way.

I have to agree with this. I like SW. The new boarding that they do is just fine; not cattle call. Yes, you line up in A, B, or C, and then you get a number. Or maybe I'm just not so picky.

I will not book AirTran. Every time I've used them, they've changed my flights at least three times, and usually to my detriment. I've actually only flown them once; other than that, I've had to cancel because of the flight changes. Once they even changed me from a non-stop to a 2 stop with plane changes! Never happened with SW.

The other thing I loved with SW - I was at Orlando airport, trying to get out and home before a storm blew in and shut down the airport. The flight I was taking was late coming in. Finally, it made it, and SW turned that plane around in less than 10 minutes! We all had our boarding numbers and everything ready before the plane landed, and we got on and out right away. We were the last flight out of Orlando that night. I don't know any other airline that can do that!

 

[roliepolieoliefan]

Definetly do not like the news. It really REALLY stinks.

Our flights from Pittsburgh are horrible to begin with and we barely have any competition now, take Air Tran out of the game and that makes it even more likely we will be paying out the wazoo for flights to anywhere. Nice!

And for those who don't think its a bad idea because you don't fly Air Tran, doesn't matter. Even if you never flew Air Tran they were still there to keep SWA and the other airlines competitve. Now there's one less airline and with it being a low cost that means SWA prices will just go up up up.

 

[marcyinPA]

This definitely should be interesting. For those of us in PHL, a few interesting things:

- An earlier post said that AirTran was the only competition for Southwest for the PHL-MCO route. AirTran may have been the only lower cost competitor, but US Airways has several nonstops to MCO, maybe more than AirTran and Southwest combined.
- AirTran flies out of ABE to MCO. I've been hoping Southwest would expand to Lehigh Valley, and perhaps this is the way. If nothing else, the addition of ABE may take a little pressure off flights out of PHL. (And Southwest's expansion to EWR might help some as well).
- For a time, AirTran also flew out of Atlantic City direct to MCO. I think AirTran still has a presence in ACY, but now they may just fly to ATL directly. If Southwest keeps ACY and phases out AirTran's hub in ATL, maybe we'll see some competition for Spirit in ACY.

I'm wondering if this will affect already booked flights from ABE to MCO in February. I don't know how fast the acquisition will take place, but I'm hoping that Southwest doesn't pull out of ABE once it takes over AirTran. Nothing good ever stays at ABE.

 

[horseshowmom]

I'm one of the people who is disappointed. I really, really like Air Tran. What minor issues I've had over the years, they've dealt with with very good customer service. I particularly LOVE being able to pay the small fee to upgrade to Business Class at the airport and always use it. According to the FAQs, that will no longer be an option. I also like having my seat assigned which will also no longer be an option. Grrr...

 

[hereyago]

I love Southwest. And now I am just thrilled.

I live about 7 minutes away from an airport, which Air Tran is at, but Southwest as of right now only flies out of a airport 30-45 minutes away and so for a 7 am flight, I have to get up at 4:30am or so, hope navy traffic isn't bad.

 

[Dax]

I read the article about this merger yesterday..some things I saw were interesting, involving SW looking at how AirTran handles the business class. I dont think Aitran is just going to go away tomorrow...this whole thing will take 2yrs at least, and the changes will be with PLENTY of warning.

 

[Pooh67_68]

I dont think Aitran is just going to go away tomorrow...this whole thing will take 2yrs at least.

This still doesn't make it good new to thoes of us who like Air Tan.

No more cheap upgrades to business class and ABE is a small airport, so if SW gets rid of the small Air Tran planes we will be forced back to flying connecting flights to MCO or flying into Sanford just so we can have direct flights.
And like so many have pointed out, less competition will probably lead to higher prices edventually.

 

[Dax]

This still doesn't make it good new to thoes of us who like Air Tan.

No more cheap upgrades to business class and ABE is a small airport, so if SW gets rid of the small Air Tran planes we will be forced back to flying connecting flights to MCO or flying into Sanford just so we can have direct flights.
And like so many have pointed out, less competition will probably lead to higher prices edventually.

Again, SW is looking to improve upon its own service. They will not be taking many flights away, this merger to them will INCREASE there presence in many newer airports. True, prices may go up. I wont disagree there, but then again, SW is looking into some of Airtrans practices to use on their own airline, so business may not just go away...

Here is the article in todays Sentinal..SW/Airtran Merger

 

[golfgal]

I am surprised to hear people that have had issues with Air Tran. I have flown them several times, exclusively for the past couple years and have never had a flight time changed, plane delayed, nothing.