Originally Posted by zahav
In light of Westjet's recent changes, I updated my spreadsheet of their flight frequency, destinations, and seats for this winter (I did one for the summer schedule as well, I posted highlights many pages back). But I'd already done a count of WS's winter schedule prior to these latest schedule updates, but just hadn't posted yet. Same as before, I only included the four airports considered 'hubs/bases/focus cities', whatever you want to call them.
Disclaimer first, do not take these numbers as the word of god lol, I just did my own counts based on Westjet flights in the schedule for each city during one sample week, so I might've miscounted or forgot something, or flubbed the math. But I think these are more or less correct, or at least you get the main takeaways still. I've broken it out by airport, in descending order largest to smallest. All comparisons shown below are the schedules the week of Dec. 16-22 2024, taken today for the latest figures, and taken a month ago for the pre-update numbers.
YVR
-436 weekly flights (341 mainline, 95 Encore), compared to 434 flights before the latest update (300 mainline, 134 Encore)
-31 destinations (doesn't include WS codeshare routes), compared to 32 destinations pre-update
~60.930 seats (n/a)
-Increases in flight frequency to YYC, YEG, YLW (mainline portion only), YWG, YXE, FLL, LAS, ORL, PSP, PHX, MZT, and SJD (12 destinations)
-Decreases in flight frequency to YLW (for Encore service), YXS (Encore), YXT (Encore), ATL, SNA, HNL, OGG, and CUN (8 destinations)
-Frequency levels maintained to YYZ, YYJ, YXJ, YQQ, YXC, YCD, LAX, KOA, LIH, HUX, PVR, and ZIH (12 destinations)
YYZ
-333 weekly flights (all mainline), compared to 339 pre-update
-40 destinations (doesn't include WS codeshare routes), compared to 38 destinations pre-update
~53,406 seats
-Increases in flight frequency to YYC, YEG, YLW, YUL, YOW, AUA, LIR, SXM, GND, RTB, and TQO (11 destinations)
-Decreases in flight frequency to FLL, RSW, ORL, MBJ, NAS, PLS, PUJ, VRA, KIN, and SJU (10 destinations)
-Frequency levels maintained to YVR, YHZ, YWG, YQR, YXE, TPA, LAS, HUX, PVR, ANU, BGI, GCM, POP, UVF, BZE, CZM, CUR, MID and BON (19 destinations)
YEG
-315 weekly flights (235 mainline, 80 Encore), compared to 295 pre-update (197 mainline and 295 Encore)
-29 destinations (doesn't include WS codeshare routes), same as pre-update
~43,123 seats
-Increases in flight frequency to YYC (mainline portion only), YVR, YYX, YLW (mainline portion only), YYJ (mainline and Encore), YWG, YUL, YOW, CUN, HUX, and SJD (11 destinations)
-Decreases in flight frequency to YYC (Encore portion only), YYZ, YHZ, YLW (Encore portion only), YQQ, YMM, YQR, YXE, LAS, and PVR (10 destinations)
-Frequency levels maintained to YQU, YZF, MSP, LAX, ORL, HNL, OGG, PSP, PHX, and MZT (10 destinations)
YWG
-171 weekly flights (142 mainline, 29 Encore), compared to 138 pre-update (113 mainline and 25 Encore)
-22 destinations (doesn't include WS codeshare routes), compared to 19 pre-update
~24,549 seats
-Increases in flight frequency to YYC, YVR, YEG, YUL, YOW, YQR, ATL, FLL, PHX, CUN, MZT, SJD, PVR (13 destinations)
-Decreases in flight frequency to YYZ, LAS, ORL, and PSP (4 destinations)
-Frequency levels maintained to YQT, YXE, LAX, HUX and MBJ (5 destinations)
So there's a few general things that stood out to me. The increases at YEG and YWG reflect the additions that WS has announced over the last few months, so even if my exact # of flights is a bit off, it's obviously picking up the right trend. YWG indeed did get lots of love for winter, as the WS press release gushes about. They had the highest increase in # of flights and destinations compared to pre-update.
Encore is bleeding like crazy, seems to be in a bit of a tailspin? Looking per airport, Encore at YVR dropped from 134 to 95 flights (meanwhile mainline grew from 300 to 341, covering the Encore losses plus 2 more, so overall flight frequency is up from 434 to 436. Same story at YEG, Encore dropped from 98 to 80, while mainline went from 197 to 228, more than offsetting the Encore frequency losses). YWG actually gained 2 more Encore flights compared to pre-update (bucking the YVR and YEG situation). And mainline went up from 113 to 142, so very solid and actual figures that back up the WS promo pieces. The Encore drops are even more noteworthy because Link closed up, and moved service to Encore. So even with adding those in, it still dragged down the figures. I will be curious to see the YYC numbers for Encore, and if even they are affected like YVR and YEG.
YYZ doesn't have Encore at all, so any discussion there is always mainline. They lost 6 frequencies compared to pre-update, but gained in destinations served.
There was actually quite a lot of chopping done to routes and frequencies, which obviously doesn't make the media releases lol. But for all the splashy announcements of increased service (go to WS's Media Room and read the articles, they have recently gone as far as indicating % increases per route), there was lots of reductions. Even somewhere like YEG, which WS made a big press release about how much they were adding, etc. etc. That is true in most measures, but they basically had almost equal parts increases, decreases, and static no change when it came to routes. More or less the same with YYZ and YVR, their increased frequency routes equalled out the decreases. With YVR, a big part of our decrease is due to Encore, our mainline grew markedly. So despite losing some things (ie. 4x weekly SNA), the increases cover the losses and with a little extra for good measure.
WS obviously still keeping their YVR base healthy, the cuts have additions elsewhere to counterbalance the situation. Sad to see them give up on SNA, it always seemed like the quintessential WS route, and they served it for years and years before AC even considered it. And yet now it's AC serving it daily, and WS bowing out. The WS Disneyland planes would shed a tear lol, RIP. But they added to so many other routes, it wasn't a loss in flights. They are up to 3x weekly to MCO now, for instance, used to be 1x weekly. PVR is 15x weekly; SJD, CUN, PSP, LAS, LAX, HNL, and OGG are all over 10x weekly (YYZ has 5 international or transborder destinations with over 10x weekly frequencies, for comparison). Their strength is still the sheer number of those sun destinations who have minimal frequencies, but are huge in # of routes. But judging from this latest update and numbers over the last few years, I don't think WS is killing it on their transborder/international performance ex-YYZ, I think there was just way too much completion, they have way more offerings from different carriers, it's just saturated. YVR, YEG, and YWG seem like more stable organic growth for WS, not relying on just a niche of sun spots to prop up its presence.
And really, the individual frequency changes up or down are typically minimal on each route, it's just when you add them together you see overall.
Despite YWG's growth, they are still well behind YEG in all measures. So the four non-YYC "hubs" are not equal, and there's a hierarchy, even if it's not spoken as such by WS. The numbers say it all for where they put resources.
Last few quick facts. The YYC-YVR route is 85x weekly, by far the highest frequency routing, as I think it has been more or less since the airline started in 1996. Although I think in YYZ's heyday as an eastern hub (pre-Covid), the YYZ-YYC route may have been bigger? I think YYZ may have actually been larger than YYC in terms of # of flights, seats, and maybe even destinations at some point in the 2005-2020 period, they were pretty formidable before. The good news for YYZers, it seems WS found a floor for how much they would cut YYZ down, and are now even making strategic additions (ie. establishing YOW, YUL, and adding new Caribbean routes again). The net decrease of only 6 flights per week shows that, it's essentially steady. But is now so far behind YYC in every way, it's night and day from 10 years ago. When I really get an energy boost and the will power, I will add YYC to the figures comparison, but that's a daunting task lol
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I just find it interesting to look into what WS does, and how they manage their capacity. For the YVR-YLW route for example, is between 5-6 daily mainline Mon-Thu, and then a mix of Encore and mainline Fri-Sun, with more Encore than mainline. I think WS leisure routes to the south are heavily weekend focused, hence routes like YLW using whatever they have on hand. Pre-Encore, there was only YLW and YXS for intra-BC routes on WS, since it was only mainline. And daily frequency was usually around 3x daily to YLW I think, so 5-6x mainline this winter is a boost. I could see YLW just being a hybrid for the forseeable future, as it is such a short distance, and easy to play with frequency and capacity as needed by mixing Encore and mainline. Encore was really a big improvement for YVR, giving us YQQ, YCD, YYJ, YXT, YXJ, and YXC on WS, none of which were served by mainline. So it's interesting to see them appear to struggle, or at least rely more on mainline. Especially compared to AC which is using their Jazz CR-700s in a bunch of routes that used to be mainline only (ie. YVR-LAX. LAS, and more). I wonder if Jazz is stealing Encore pilots or something.
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