JetBlue will add more Mint flights on transcon routes this fall. (Image: JetBlue)
The big news this week for transcontinental travelers was United’s announcement that it plans to move its New York-to-California p.s. flights from JFK to Newark Airport. But other airlines in the market are planning some transcon changes of their own — although hardly as dramatic.
At Delta, which is acquiring takeoff and landing slots at JFK from United when the latter moves to Newark in late October, an official told the Associated Press that the carrier will lay on an extra JFK-Los Angeles flight and will put twin-aisle 767s on three of its daily JFK-San Francisco departures. Delta currently uses 757s for all of its JFK-SFO flights.
Related: Trip Report: JetBlue Mint | Trip Report: American’s new A321 SFO-JFK
JetBlue said this week it has scheduled additional deployment of aircraft equipped with its upscale Mint cabins on both the JFK-San Francisco and JFK-Los Angeles routes. By October 25, JetBlue said, it will offer Mint service on up to six daily JFK-San Francisco A321 flights. On the same date, it will start adding Mint-equipped planes to the JFK-LAX route, making that service available on up to 10 daily flights by February.
“Customers should also stay tuned for additional Mint fleet expansion in 2016,” the company said.
Also, American Airlines reportedly plans to increase capacity between San Francisco and New York JFK starting September 9, going from the current five daily roundtrips to six or seven. At the same time, AA will boost San Francisco-LAX schedules from nine flights a day to 11 or 12.
Best news about all this? More opportunities for upgrades to the carriers’ super-premium cabins on transcon routes. Or at least more competition leading to lower prices.
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Thank goodness AA is finally upping the SFO-LAX service. They haven’t had enough of these flights for a while. Tons of capacity on this route will hopefully lead to lower fares, too!
Well, I suppose having more options to get to the east coast are good, but I resist business trips to NYC and Washington DC because I simply can’t deal with the cramped seats in the economy section.
Boeing and Airbus could make a lot of money by redesigning airplane seats. Put them on wheeled tracks so they can roll forward or backward and then be locked into place before take-off. When you buy an airplane ticket, you can buy however many inches of leg room you wish, and each flight can be reconfigured just before boarding time to match whatever the passengers for that flight bought. Yes, I am joking, but not totally…