[AustinTex]

I have friends who work at Jetblue, and they gave me some inside info.

Here's the deal: JetBlue operates 2 kinds of aircraft, Airbus A320s and Embraer 190s. The A320s have 150 seats, the E-190s have 100 seats. The A320s can fly cross country without stopping to refuel, but the E-190s cannot. They need a midway point. The E-190s are GREAT planes because they have a lot of room, the windows are positioned higher than other similar sized aircraft, and they can serve less-trafficed routes yet still fill the plane.....without feeling like you're on a smaller plane. They have engines underneath the wings and have a Boeing 737 kind of feel, or for aviation enthusiasts, a reduced sized version of the A320/318.

Because they DO have a need for the E-190s to service routes (especially in these gas sensitive times and less passengers willing to travel), these E-190s have become very valuable to the airline. They searched for a midway point, a refueling city, a passenger exchange city, and it came down to Houston and Austin. JetBlue already like the business boom it saw when they started AUS service and stated the demographics made the city perfect to serve as it's E-190 coast to coast midway point. Mind you, the other airline model similar to JetBlue would be Southwest, and they do the most business out of AUS.

So, JetBlue announced to their staff they would use Austin as the midway city, and immediately, a number of pilots and their families jumped on the opportunity to move out of snow-locked Boston, and they bought homes here. The plans are, as they were, to slowly expand service out of AUS taking on Southwest. American dropped the Seattle and Orange County flights, not due to a lack of Austin traffic, but the other way around. Orange County (SNA) was on the national news the other night as being one of the most prominent airports in the nation to actually suffer badly due to having LAX and Long Beach so close with a gas price hike, and airlines are needing to consolidate and focus routes most efficiently. SNA (Orange County) is expected to lose A LOT of their service. The extent of the losses have not been realized yet, but the news is NOT good.

As for JetBlue, they could not have landed this structure any more timely. Yes, they will be adding routes. Which ones will be added are under wraps, but being that they use the E-190s out of AUS, they could potentially add a good number more since demand for the smaller aircraft will be of great importance in saving money overall. And yes, they will be taking up whatever valuable routes other airlines cannot maintain out of AUS. The only downside: they don't have too many E-190s. So, if traffic does demand, they may have to incorporate some A320s into the mix as well.

Again, this is not an Austin issue. This is an airline issue - and the cities losing the most flights are Chicago O'Hare, Boston, San Juan P.R., SNA, and 16 others, AUS not being one of them listed. If I can locate the list again, I'll post it.

But yes, Austin is the Coast to Coast connector city for JetBlue though it's in its initial phase right now. It may not look like a lot, but when pilots move their families for work, you know there are changes coming that would justify such a decision.