Winging It

.

The U.S. Senate Commerce Committee is conducting a hearing today in Washington to look into airline industry consolidation, a topic that could have a profound effect on travelers who use Philadelphia International Aiurport. Among the issues: How would service and fares at PHL be affected were US Airways to acquire Delta, and the surviving entity "rationalizes" its route structture in a way that cuts the number of flights or airplane seats available ?

Nerws releases and the text of US Airways CEO Doug Parker's testimony at the hearing can be found at the airline's Website, usairways.com. Another view, from Delta CEO Gerald Grinstein, can be found on delta.com, (search for Newsroom on the Delta site).

One group of passengers who are mad as hell at the airline industry is using the hearing to issue a call for a passengers' Bill of Rights. These folks are angry because on Dec. 29,. they were among hundreds of American Airlines passengers stranded aboard planes that sat on the ground for as long as nine hours at the Austin (Tex.) Bergstrom International Airport. The travelers, whose flights were diverted to Austin by bad weather elsewhere, had no water, food or sanitary restroom facilities during their ordeal. And they're not happy with the airline's response to their treatment, offering little in the way of compensation, the group says.

The movement that this group of travelers could start has been brewing for awhile, with complaints about airline service growing. We will keep up with it and report further developments as they happen.

The federal government issued its Air Travel Price Index (ATPI) for the third quarter of 2006, and the results won't surprise you if you've were flying much last year. Fares shot up in the third quarter at the fastest rate for that three-month period in the 11 years the index has been around. If you like statistics, check out the details at the Department of Transportation’s Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) Website, bts.gov. Analysts who keep track of the industry say the major network carriers have raised fares a dozen times since the start of 2006.

Raising ticket prices is among the management decisions airlines seldom announce widely.That was the case overnight when Delta Air Lines raised its base coach fares by $5 each way. Analyst Jamie Baker of JP Morgan Securities reported in an investors' note today that American and Alaska matched the increase, making it likely that the other "legacy carriers" -- Continental, Northwest, United and US Airways -- will do the same over the weekend.

The increase was the second one for that group of airlines this year and brings to about a dozen the number of times base fares gone up since the start of 2006. Pushing up the full coach fares also means many lower-priced tickets also rise, since they're based on a percentage discount from the highest fare. The upward cycle of fares, along with cuts in capacity (the number of flights and seats available) by many arilines last year, helped them make money, a rare occurrence for most of them since their salad days in the 1990s .

Discounts are still out there, of course, especially if you can book weeks in advance and are willing to take connecting flights on the majors. But seldom does a major carrier put all of its non-stop flights on sale at the same time -- unless it faces competition from a low-cost ariline on a route. So watch, too, what the low-cost carriers, led by AirTran and Southwest at PHL, are doing. Every few weeks, they put all or most of their advance-purchase tickets on sale..

Check out the most recent news on Delta Air Lines bankruptcy reorganization since it turned down US Ariways' dream of a merger.

Read the full story here.

Forget what we said Friday evening about a $5-one-way fare increase for the major airlines. Over the weekend, other carriers failed to match the increase that was initiated by Delta Air Lines, and it was rescinded by those that had adopted it. Industry analyst Jamie Baker of JP Morgan Securities notes that this is the second failure out of three attempts this year by the older legacy airlines to push up prices.

One of my colleagues in the business of writing about airlines, Trebor Banstetter of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, has added more understanding of what happened to the big carriers' most recent effort at a fare increase. Here's what he found, in an article published yesterday:

Analysts say fares may have stabilized for now
TREBOR BANSTETTER
STAR-TELEGRAM STAFF WRITER

After a year of steady increases in airfares, prices may have finally peaked, at least for now, according to airline-industry analysts.
A broad $10 increase on round-trip tickets that was implemented late last week by several airlines, including Fort Worth-based American, collapsed Monday after it was rescinded by United Airlines.

It was the year's second price increase to be withdrawn after just a few days. Only one fare increase has stuck so far in 2007.

The collapses could be a sign that airline ticket prices are stabilizing.

"The relevance and likelihood of future increases is increasingly debatable," analyst Jamie Baker of JPMorgan Securities said in a note to investors Monday.

The sharp uptick in ticket prices was a key component of the airline industry's return to profitability last year. The major carriers raised fares by an average of nearly 10 percent in 2006, according to analyst Ray Neidl of Calyon Securities.

But that growth slowed considerably toward year's end. Domestic fares in December, for example, were up less than 2 percent from December 2005, according to the Air Transport Association. That was the slowest rate of growth all year.

Neidl is forecasting that fares will increase just 1 percent this year.

While it's good news for travelers, a softening of ticket prices could slow revenue growth at the major carriers, pressuring them to cut costs further.

Look on the bright side: Flight delays at PHL aren't getting worse, and in one way, they're getting better.

Philadelphia improved its ranking for on-time airline departures in 2006, moving from last place to No. 27 out of 31 large airports, the U.S. Bureau of Transportation Statistics reporrted today. . The agency said 72.2 percent of flights left Philadelphia on time last year, compared with 71.9 percent in 2005. In on-time arrivals, the airport was in 27th place in both years; 70.4 percent of flights arrived on time last year, compared with 71.8 percent in 2005.

Nationwide, airline delays last year rose to their highest level since 2000, the federal data shows. About 22.6 percent of flights arrived at least 15 minutes late, the most since record delays of 23.9 percent in 2000.

Spirit Airlines doesn't serve PHL but it does fly to Atlantic City International Airport, so some of you may find this of use. Starting Saturday, Spirit will allow a passenger one piece of free checked luggage. The second checked bag will cost $10. More than two bags costs even more, as they do on most airlines these days. Southwest is the only major carrier that allows three bags at no charge. Spirit appears to be the only one with a one-bag limit, but if there is a foreign airline with the same policy we haven't heard about, let us know.

Thanks to those of you who alerted us to at least two other airlines, both foreign, with limits on checked or carry-on bags. As noted in the comments about last week's Spirit Airlines posting, Virgin Blue, the Australian discount carrier, is one of the airlines. Of course, it doesn't serve PHL.

What British Airways is doing needs a little more space, and it does serve PHL. Starting tomorrow, BA will institute a limit of one free checked bag weighing up to 23 kilograms (about 50 pounds) on coach passengers, on both transatlantic and intra-Europe flights. Checking more than one bag will cost extra. Those in other classes of service are allowed to check more free. BA also has a carry-on limit of one bag per passenger, which is different from most domestic airlines.

When it comes to baggage rules, it should be mandatory to check an airline's Website to make sure you know what's allowed before getting to the airport. Find the latest from BA
here

Soutwest Airlines was the leader this time in raising most of its fares. Southwest prices went up $2 each way on flights of 400 miles and less, $3 each way on flights of 401 to 999 miles, and $10 each way on flights of 1,000 miles or more. Southwest put the higher fares up Friday night, and by today, the six other big airlines had largely matched the increase. The smaller carriers did not raise prices, or haven't decided yet whether to match.

This is the first fare increase of 2007 for Southwest, and its seventh since the start of last year. The other major carriers have increased ticket prices a dozen times since the start of 2006.

Frequent air travelers know this, so here's some information for the less-than-frequent. AirTran Airways became the first airline we've seen to issue a news release this afternoon about the big winter storm that's moving across the Midwest and will hit the East Coast tomorrow. As carriers always do during big weather events, AirTran will relax its rules on penalizing passengers who need to change their flights. If you're flying this week, check the Website of your airline to see what you need to do to adjust. You will find links to airlines serving PHL in the column to the right.

The snow is flying in the Philadelphia area this morning, but most flights are still operating on schedule, according to PHL's handy Website, which has real-time arrival and departure information. You can check on your flight here.

That "wintry mix" is getting heavier. Most flights to and from PHL are operating late and about 25 percent had been canceled as of mid-afternoon. Keep checking with your airline or the airport's Web site if you're flying.

No suprise: PHL is not operating normally, but it is open and crews have been working to keep runways clear. Here is what you need to know, from our story posted on philly.com.

Air travel: Philadelphia International "Through about 11 o'clock about 50 percent of arrival and departures are canceled," says Mark Pesce, spokesman for Philadelphia International Airport. "We also have numerous delays." For flight information, go to http://www.phl.org or call 1-800-745-4283 (1-800-PHL-GATE). "The airport is operational," he said. "We've had crews working since yesterday keeping our airfield open, our roadway system, our sidewalks, everything that we do here." About 300 city employees help with airport snow removal, using 50 large pieces of equipment and assorted smaller ones to the airport's 25 million square feet of concrete, he said. "The airfield alone is 16 million square feet." (During better weather, those employees do other kind of maintenance.)

The number of cancellations is down compared with yesterday, but the weaher continues to affect PHL operations. Many flights are running a half hour to two hours behind schedule.
You can check on your flight here.

A post on Monday (see One-bag airlines) had incorrect information about British Airways' policy for checked bags on transatlantic flights. The airline will allow two checked bags for coach passengers. When you check the BA Website for detailed information under "checked baggage allowances," don't be confused, as we were, by looking at the limits for "Europe and all other international routes." Keep moving down the page to "USA etc." routes. On another portion of the Website, you have to watch for the asterisk that shows the exception for US flights. We appreciate a commenter for pointing out the error. Find the rules on the BA Website here

Local broadcast coverage of the aftermath of last week's snow and ice would lead one to believe that there's a repeat going on of US Airways' infamous baggage-service meltdown during the 2004 Christmas holidays. That's not true. Then, as now, this is an easy story for TV stations to do because it's a visual about the airport they can capture on tape without going through security, or in fact doing much work at all. Here's the way we look at the "story."

When it snows, especially when mixed with ice, airports and airlines slow down. If they didn't, safety could easily be compromised. US Airways ramp workers who load bags and direct planes in and out know this: There were several broken bones and cuts requiiring stiches for workers who slipped and fell last week. Of course, flights are going to be delayed and many cancelled. Bags are going to miss connections. Some will take days to find their owners. The bag-tracing phone lines at US Airways and other airlines will be jammed, and you may be cut off. In the end, only a tiny handful of bags will be truly lost. On average more than 99 percent of all checked bags are delivered when they're supposed to be, at the end of a flight.

But is the number of bags that piled up over the weekend at PHL unusual for US Airways or any airline? The answer is no. About 700 bags were in the US Airways bag-claim area yesterday. By this morning, when the story was still being broadcast, there were betrween 300 and 400 bags still waiting to be reunited with their owners. US Airways carries about 60 percent of the 31-million-plus passengers who use the airport annually. If each passenger checks one bag, which is average, US Airways handles close to 20 million bags a year -- just at PHL.

PHL has experienced flight delays and a few cancellations today, mostly because of the big winter storm that's beaten up the Midwest and Northeast the last few days. As always, check with your airline or the airport's phl.org Website if you're planning a trip.

Elsewhere, JetBlue canceled more flights at its hub at JFK in New York. For the most recent story posted on philly.com click here

We have added a handy feature to philly.com that provides links to all of the key traffic and weather Websites in the Philadelphia region.Watch the traffic move -- or not -- or I-95, get the latest updates on highway conditions, check on mass transit or on the status of a flight to or from PHL. A link directly from this page can be found near the bottom of the right-hand column, under useful sites. Take a look here

A JetBlue Airways flight enroute from Pittsburgh to New York's Kennedy Airport made an unscheduled landing this morning at Philadelphia International Airport. The diversion was not an emergency. The 54 passengers were given a choice of getting off and finding their own way to the New York area, or riding a bus to JFK that JetBlue chartered.

JetBlue, airport and FAA officials explained what happened. The captain of the jet dverted after a cockpit instrument indicated a problem with de-icing devices, which are mounted on the leading edge (the front part) of the wings. The devices prevent ice from building up on the wings as the plane passes through cold, wet air. The air near Kennedy had the potential for an ice buildup, so the captain decided to do the prudent thing and go to PHL, the nearest major airport where conditions were better. The FAA doesn't keep track of diversions but they're not uncommon, and they usually are because of weather conditions at the scheduled destination..In fact, three United Airline flights headed to Washington Dulles were diverted to other airports today because of the weather, an FAA spokesman said.

For anyone living in a cave the last two weeks,. JetBlue was criticized after bad weather stranded passengers in planes at JFK, its main hub, for up to 10 1/2 hours after the Valentine's Day storm. The airline has been playing catchup, promising a better performance in the future.

US Airways has had success in using PHL as its main international hub, but all the routes go south or east, to the Caribbean, Latin America or Europe. Now the airline says it wants to do something completely different here: Nonstops to China. Read more about it: here

US Airways CEO Duog Parker was in Philadelphia yesterday, appearing at City Hall to formally announce, as we reported, that the airline wants PHL-to-China route authority. But the most interesting comment he made was that flights to Shanghai could also lead to US Airways flying nonstop to Tokyo, since the airline would need to buy or lease long-range jets. Read more here

If you're planning to fly US Airways from Sunday on next week, you may want to hold your breath for this: The airline this weekend switches to a single computer reservations system, integrating what have been separate US Airways and America West systems.The airline says it's been testing the new combined system for weeks, and it chose to do the switch on a weekend when the fewest number of passengers could be affected. Let's hope for the best, but US Airways warned in its weekly newsletter to employees today that "a migration from one reservations system to another, no matter how carefully planned and tested, is a complex task and may have hiccups."

US Airways warned Friday that there could be "hiccups" when it integrated the old America West and US Airways computer reservations systems into a single new one. Now it looks like it was more like loud belching and severe indigestion. An independent flight-data monitoring service, FlightStats, reported last night that just 14 percent of US Airways flights departed yesterday within 15 minutes of schedule, and two out of five flights left the gate more then 45 minutes late. US Airways said this morning that about half its flights arrived on time yesterday.
Travelers also reported difficulty accessing usairways.com but the Website appears to be working OK now. If you're traveling on US Airways, let us know about your experience. And we will update you later today.

The snow is blowing sideways around Philadelphia this morning, with one to three inches forecasted by nightfall. PHL is open but delays are running anywhere from a few minutes to two or three hours, according to the airports phl.org Website. We will update later today. In the meantime, as you languish in a lounge or airport club, please let us know how your trip is going.

PHL has the experienced the usual delays a snow day brings. The airport has closed one runway at a time to clear snow, which always slows operations, but the runways have never been completely shut down. US Airways canceled nine mainline, large-jet flights, 6 percent of its schedule, and scrubbed 63 Express flights, about 22 percent of the total. Other carriers also have canceled flights. Most flights are arriving or departing from a few minutes to several hours late.

.

But that doesn't mean it was a cheery morning for quite a few travelers. More than half of departures and arrivals were 15 or more minutes late before noon today, according to the flightstats.com Website. Schedules have gotten much better since noon, with just 15 percent of departures and 10 percent of arrivals running late, flightstats says. We're getting fewer reports of long lines at US Airways today than we did the last four days. Please keep us informed as you travel..You can find flightstats.com here

As you may have read in The Inquirer or other newspapers, some Delaware County residents and many of its political leaders are opposed to a plan the FAA is studying that's designed to reduce flgiht delays in and out of PHL. The FAA is expected later this spring to choose one of four alternatives for rerouting air traffic, or leaving flight paths as they are now. Read the most recent Inquirer story on the issue,

We're reporting today from US Airways annual media day at its Tempe, AZ, headquatrters, and one of the first words out of CEO Doug Parker's mouth were: "We're not running as good an airline as we'd like or thought we would be. The key to that is fixing Philadelphia." The day promises more briefings on just what the airline's senior executives are going to do to improve its PHL operations. Parker and president Scott Kirby also were out front on the messy switchover to an integrated US Airways-America West reservations system that caused so many long lines and delayed flights last week.

A cold rain, but no snow, is falling in the Philadelphia area this morning, with a mix of snow and rain forecast for tonight. Just before 9 a.m., about 65 percent of scheduled departures and arrivals so far today were on time, according to flightstats.com. Look for more delays and cancellations to the upper Midwest and the Northeast as the winter storm moves up the coast. Several airlines are making their usual offers allowing changes to tickets without penalty to those affected by the weather.

Speaking of forecasts, the FAA has issued a long-range estimate for growth in air traffic. No surprise, the increase is going to be large. Read more here

Conditions are getting worse at PHL, with the rain mixing with sleet and ice pellets. US Airways has canceled flights and delays are running as long as three or four hours. United and Southwest have cancelled most or all of their schedules for the day, an airport spokeswoman says. Elswhere, JetBlue Airways, still smarting from its big breakdown in service last month, preemptively cancelled most of its flights from JFK and Newark airports. Keep checking with your airline if you're flying. The phl.org Website's real-time flight arrival and departure service is working only intermittently.

It's been another bad day at PHL for airlines and their passengers trying to recover from the surprisingly nasty winter storm. This morning's Inquirer news story about what happened yesterday can still be found on philly.com. We said in the story there were no "immediate" reports of long strandings on airplanes. Now there are. See the comment from Kevin sent last night but just posted. We will continue reporting on how the airlines and the airport handled the situation.

After last weekend's problems with weather and US Airways computer problems at PHL, you may not want to take another flight for awhile. But why not dream a little, and think about what it would be like to ride on a 600-passenger jet. Check out today's print and online story about the first U.S. flight of the Airbus 380 jet here

Many of you have posted comments here, sent us e-mail or called regarding the last four days at PHL and US Airways performance. At about 2 p.m. today, there were still about 1,000 misplaced bags (we counted) in US Airways B-C bag-claim area. There are scattered reports of piles of bags in other airports also, waiting to be reunited with their owners. We spoke yesterday to a local leader of the customer-service agents' union, for a print and online story. Read what she says the problem is. here.

One way business journalists learn what airlines are doing is listening to Webcasts of their presentations to industry analysts. You can listen to one of these by US Airways earlier today by clicking here. It may take a few hours for the sponsor, JP Morgan, to get the US Airways presentation up on the site.

These kind of presentations to investment companies are archived on the "investor relations" portion of the US Airways Website, allowing you to listen at your convenience. Other major airlines also are presenting at the JP Morgan conference, and you can usually find their executives' remarks in the same way, by going to the investor relations portions of their Websites.

PHL gest a bad rap whenever the weather disrupts normal operations, and many of you believe it deserves it. No doubt, the grounding of all flights during last Friday's sleet caused as much pain and suffering to travelers as any storm has recently. The local media was out in force to report on how passengers were affected. Sleeping in an airport is no fun -- there's no way to minimize how grim that can be.

But most of what happened to travelers was beyond the airport's control. The airlines were required by the FAA to stop flying while ice was falling -- they had no choice about cancellatioins.The response of US Airways was another matter that has been written and talked about and some of you have vented about it (Please, keep it up.) .The airline has a new computer system that employees say doesn't work properly and that only made the dismal experience of waiting to rebook even worse. But the airport staff didn't take the weekend off. Many employees made a serious effort to do what they could to help. If you want to know more about how the airport's managers view the way they responded, read a news release the airport issued this afternoon here

International aviation agreements aren't a topic most travelers think much about. Indeed, reading them can put you to sleep. But they affect what we pay for overseas airline service and our choices of airlines. The U.S. and EU governments are moving steadily toward what the Europeans call "liberalization" (liberalisation in European English) of the transatlantic market, with the promise of greater competitition bringing lower fares. Read the most recent action taken by the EU here

Read today's update on plans to redesign the airspace in the Northeast to try to reduce flight delays here.

In the early 1990s, the U.S. Department of Transportation identified a phenomenon it called "the Southwest effect," to show what happens when the airline starts service in a new city: fares drop and traffic goes up. Today, there's no better example of the effect than traffic at Philadelphia International. Read details in our report on PHL traffic in 2006 here

Delta Air Lines plans to be out of Chapter 11 by April 30. For the full story click here.

Too often, we neglect the airlines serving PHL that don't have large market shares, even when they are based in our region and seem to have happy customers. We're talking about USA 3000, which the readers of Travel + Lesure magazine this month ranked as the third-best domestic airline, based on providing good value for your money. USA 3000 is an affiliate of Apple Vacations, based in Newtown Square, Delaware County, and one of the world's largest sellers of air-and-hotel package vacations. Travel + Leisure's affluent well-traveled readers found the best value in airlines to be JetBlue, followed by Southwest and USA 3000. The survey was conducted about a year ago. You can find the whole article here

The airline ranking is a big surprise -- at least to us. Look at the list of best hotels or cruise lines, which, again, were rated on the basis of value: It includes some of the classiest and most expensive hotels and cruise lines in the world. JetBlue has a well-deserved reputation for quality service, even after the operational problems of Valentine's Day, but it also has low fares. Southwest and to some extent USA 3000 are known more for low fares but also for reliable service .So it turns out that an airline doesn't necessarily have to fly around the world or have first-class sleeper seats to keep demanding customers happy. Providing good service at a fair price looks to us to be way to go. Tell us what you think by posting a comment.

You may have seen a story in print today about the Airline Quality Rating, an annual recounting of satistics about the airlines that are kept by the federal government. If you missed it you can find it here.

This yearly exercise has its fans, because it is a good roundup of data and it's an easy way for the media to report on the airlines. But Mike Boyd, a longtime aviation consultant in Evergreen, Colo., is not among them. Read what he has to say, in great detail, here

The Federal Aviation Administration is in the midst of deciding whether to raise, from 60 to 65, the age at which commercial airline pilots must retire. The thinking behind the proposed change is that pilots are healthier and live longer today than they did in 1959, when the restriction was adopted. The FAA's deliberative process is expected to take until the end of the year. But that's not fast enough for a group of fliers who have formed the Senior Pilots Coalition. Three US Airways pilots affected by the retirement rule filed suit in federal court last week, demanding an immediate end to it. Read the Associated Press story on the pilots efforts here . And tell us what you think of the age-60 rule in a comment.

The vast majority of airline passengers won't care why the Federal Communications did it, but the agency had the good sense to decide to keep a rule in place prohibiting cell phone use during flights. The FCC said the reason was technical, but a ton of travelers -- including frequent business travelers, flight attendants and vacationers -- had sent comments opposing the change. Even if the FCC had said OK, the Federal Aviation Administration still could have prevented phone use after the aircraft door is closed. The reason for keeping the ban is that no one is sure that cell phoness won't interfere with navigational equipment during key times of a flight. There are even questions whether other electroinic devices, such as PDAs and laptops, which are now allowed over 10,000 feet, could cause the same kind of interferece, a subject that needs considerably more study.

Now you know what we think. Tell us your opinion of the FCC decision. Learn a little more about the ruling here

Because you have found your way to this blog, chances are good you use the Internet regularly to search for air fares, hotels and rental cars, and you probably book your own travel online as well. Travel Websites have some of the highest traffic of any on the Internet .But we're curious whether you also use travel agents, the kind of folks who once were ubiquitous but have faded from public view in many places, their work apparently taken over by you, the consumer.

We're curious because of some suprising figures released this week by Topaz International, an Oregon firm that audits what larger companies are spending with the airlines on business travel. Corporate travel agents, according to Topaz, save their clients money -- lots of it -- compared with what's travelers can find on the Internet. This is the sixth year in a row Topaz has made the same comparative study and the results have been the same each time. In 2006,.the average agency fare was $508 and the lowest available Internet fare for the same itinerary was $583, a difference of 15 percent. Most of the firm's clients are big companies to which the airlines give volume discounts. But some were mid-sized, spending $20 million or less a year with the airlines, and even those businesses saved more than 8 percent per ticket. (The Topaz news release with more data can be found here.

The data from Topaz dovetails with what to us is an even more surprising fact about the way people buy airline tickets these days. According to the American Society of Travel Agents, 51 percent are still sold by agents, ranging from giant companies like American Express to individuals who work from home. That number fell over the last decade from about 80 percent, as the Internet grew and airlines stopped giving agents commissions. But one reason half of the tickets are still issued by agents is in what Topaz found: Not all the bargains -- and even less of the service agents offer -- are online.

Perhaps we're hitting our stride with this blog. The day has been very busy with other work and we just checked in to see if anyone had commented on yesterday's post about travel agents vs. the Web. For a journalist nothing is more pleasing than to know someone is reading his stuff, and for this post, I know you did. Thanks for the interest and please keep the comments coming. We will do some more reporting on the topic in coming days or weeks.

American Airlines has added another weapon in its marketing arsenal: a Website desgined for female travelers. The site, Women Travelers Connected has practical advice, similar to what many other sites have, on issues such as safety and security, and travel offers for women and female groups. Wyndham Hotels, which pioneered the concept of catering to the needs and wants of female business travelers a dozen years ago, is a marketing partner.

Perhaps this is the beginning of a great trend for airlines. When Wyndham and other lodging companies woke up in the 1990s to women's interests, hotel security improved, guest rooms got more comfortable, bedding was upgraded and bathrooms in particular got better with more lighting, more counter space and much nicer soap, shampoo and other amenities. Will other airlines follow American's lead? As always, please tell us what you think.

Airline passengers who've been stuck for hours on airplanes that don't move in bad weather got a hearing today in Washington before the Senate Commerce Committee as the panel took testimony on a proposed passengers bill of rights. The legislation would allow airlines to hold passengers no more than three hours on a plane that has left the gate but not taken off, and provide adequate food, water and bathroom facilities during long delays. The effort to force carriers to provide better service grew out of the experience of customers on American Airlines flights in Texas in December, who formed the Coaltiion for an Airline Passengers' Bill of Rights and started a blog about it. The effort gained ground after the JetBlue debacle at JFK in New York on Feb. 14. And it probably gained a few adherents among US Airways passengers who were stranded close to eight hours at PHL on March 16.

This issue has great appeal to the legions of fliers who've been abused by airlines. Two national consumer groups joined the Coalition this week, agreeing that nothing short of new federal rules will make airlines behave better. The airlines have a different view, of course, as do some other groups that represent the interests of travelers. The views of one of them, the Business Travel Coalition, can be found here .

Overheard today walking down Market Street in Center City, one young woman to her friend: "I wish it would get warm." Don't we all! The heavy, chilly rain across the region has hurt airline schedules all day at PHL, although operations began improving after 3 p.m., according to flightstats.com. The FAA had the airport under a ground delay, meaning the majority of arrivals and departures were running from a few mnutes to three or four hours late. The forecast for tomorrow calls for sun and wind, with a return to more chilly weather -- and a chance for the proverbial "wintry mix" of rain and snow Sunday and Monday. Stay warm.

Mary Peters, the U.S. secretary of transporation, was in China this week to talk about loosening the limits on air service to one of the world's fastest-growing economies. Here's a link to the AP story from Beijing. The story doesn't include the name of US Airways, which as you may have read here, intends to apply for the right to fly nonstop between Philadelphia and Shanghai, starting next year. Today's development means the odds of US Airways getting a China route may have grown a little. But don't make plans just yet. American, Continental and Delta also would love to go nonstop from one of their hubs to China.

You may want to do what a Road Warrior who called me at home today (he's my brother-in-law so it was OK) did with his plans to spend a week doing business in South Jersey. His flight from DFW was canceled, and he put off the whole trip until next week. The heavy rain means delays at PHL are averaging an hour and a half, about 50 to 60 percent of flights are on time, and there are a handful of cancelations by a variety of airlines. Southwest is keeping more of its schedule intact than any other PHL major carrier. Check the phl.org Website if you're flying. Take care out there.

Read the latest on what US Airways CEO Doug Parker made last year, and what some representatives of the airline's employees say about it here

American is the first major airline to report first-quarter earnings. If you want to see how the winter weather treated the carrier, and how it overcame it, go here. Watch for other airlines, starting with Southwest tomorrow, to report how they did financially in what is usually the weakest quarter for revenue for the industry.

To no one's surprise, Southwest Airlines reported its 64th consecutive profitable quarter today. Read the news story by the AP here. Wall Street analysts who follow the industry are concerned that what's now the largest U.S. airline in passengers flown is facing cost pressures, from fuel and labor, at a time when the economy is sluggish and customers are resisting higher fares. Some analysts are downright unhappy and downgrading its stock, The runup in fares that many business travelers experienced in early 2006 ran into resistance in the second half of the year, and that resistance continued into the first quarter..Lousy weather in the Northeast and Midwest didn't help either.

More interesting, and pertinent to the lives of frequent travelers, was what Southwest CEO Gary Kelly said during a question-and-answer session with the analysts and reporters. He's also concerned about costs. But he's confident Southwest will find ways -- as it has for its 36 years in business -- to get more productivity out of employees while still keeping customers happy. The airline is considering adding wireless internet acess to its planes, along with some type of entertainment system, but not for a couple of years probably. As you may have heard, it's also studying whether to offer reserved seats, a radical departure from its unreserved practice now, and is looking at international service (think Mexico or Canada). "We have an array of things that aren't ready for prime time," Kelly said.

But Kelly indicated that Southwest isn't thinking of charging for services such as talking to a live human being on the phone, checking bags or otherwise nickel-and-dimeing customers, What he's most determined to do is continue to be different than other airlines. Southwest will still have its own style of service, and it will continue to focus on keeping fares low and service frequent on the routes heavily used by business travelers. Despite last year's fare increases, and the nasty weather that spoiled some vacations this year, "those Road Warriors just seem to plow on through," Kely said.

You can hear replays of Southwest's, American's and Continental's earnings conference call on their Website (links in the right-hand column of this homepage), as you can with most carriers these days, on a quarterly basis.

Are you among the legions who never got to fly the supersonic Concorde but wished you had the money to do it while it was still around? The next best thing may be to vacation in Barbados and see one of the birds on display. Read a news release on the Caribbean nation's newest attraction (including entrance fees) here

Another Congressional hearing today, this time in the House, on the passenger bill of rights legislation. As you will recall, the proposed regulations stemmed from the stranding of passengers on major airlines' planes during snowstorms over the winter. Opinions vary whether using federal law is the best way to make carriers behave better. Today it was the turn of the American Society of Travel Agents to weigh in, and they are in favor. Read the testimony it presented to a House committee here

ACY, Atlantic City International Airport, located about 50 miles southeast of Center City, is one of several in the Philadelphia area that weary travelers, and the occasional politician, like to talk about as an alternative to PHL. Instead of trying to reconfigure the airspace around Philadelphia and New York as a way to reduce congestion and flight delays, as the FAA hopes to do, why don't airlines just use ACY more? That could, in fact, happen, according to a longtime industry consultant, Michael Boyd, who addressed an Atlantic County Transportation Forum at Richard Stockton College of New Jersey last week. But, Boyd said, it will require major carriers providing more connecting flights to ACY from their hubs. Today, only Delta does that, with three--a-day regional jets to and from Atlanta. Leisure-oriented Spirit Airlines has the only other scheduled service now, to Florida, Las Vegas and the Caribbean, and to its Detroit hub in the summer. Almost a million passengers used ACY last year, compared with almost 32 million at PHL. Less than a third of the travelers using ACY are there just to go to Atlantic City, out of a total of 34 million visitors a year. Here is a link to the ACY Website.

You may have seen a story in print today by Bloomberg News about gasoline prices, including the opinion of some that they could hit $4 a gallon this summer. AAA Mid-Atlantic, the regional motor club, which tracks prices in this region, says don't believe it. AAA spokeswoman Catherine Rossi said in a news release that prices may get to $3 a gallon but that the organization doesn't expect them to reach the average of $3 to $4 a gallon. And if oil refineries can catch up with demand in the next few weeks, "AAA believes motorists will actually see lower gas prices this summer than than they see right now," she said. "Given what we know right now, a $3-$4 average in most areas is unlikely."

Delta Air Lines's reorganization plan receivved U.S. Bankruptcy Court approval today, paving the way for it to leave Chapter 11 protection. Delta has been more active than any other carrier in the last year or two in adding regional-jet flights that connect its big Atlanta hub to smaller cities. In this region, that means service for Atlantic City International, and a revival of flights at the Trenton/Mercer Couty and Wilmington/New Castle County airports. Those last two had not had scheduled flights for years before Delta Connection flights started. Read the AP story on Delta's reorganization here.

US Airways reported a $66 million first-quarter profit this morning. Of more interest to passengers: The airline announced that it would hire more airport employees and take other steps to improve the US Airways "experience." News releases on the earnings and the customer-service initiative can be found at US Airways.com. Go to "About Us" and then "press room." Click here for our story from Friday's paper.

With thunderstorms moving through the region, some PHL operations are running behind schedule but most flights are on time. Expect the weather to disrupt service at numerous airports in the Northeast and Midwest today.

Following the progress of new airlines that start out small is one of the more enjoyable aspects of this reporter's job. We report in a print story this morning on one that some Philadelphia-area residents may find useful, a new all-business class airline that fles between Newark and London Luton Airport. Silverjet has just one airplane, and it's in a high-risk competitive game, but watch for it to grow. Of particular interest are the business class fares on Silverjet, compared with what a coach ticket to London costs. Learn more about Silverjet here.

More than 100 US Airways pilots showed their displeasure with management yesterday at PHL. Read more here.

Two airlines that serve PHL -- and both happen to base their operationis in Atlanta -- are in the news

AirTran Airways is expanding in many places, adding flighs to its Atlanta hub and elsewhere, and announced this morning that it set a one-day record for the number of newly hired employees who showd up for their first day of orientation -- 152. Some of the new hires will be stationed at PHL. AirTran CEO Joe Leonard promised last June that the little airline that's not so little anymore would hire 2,500 people over the next five years,.The company said it's on pace to do that, having hired.800 since last July 1, and now has a total of 8,537 employees.

The second airline, Delta, made its formal exit from Chapter 11 today. The airline has fewer employees, most of whom took pay cuts; the pilots had their pensions reduced; the previous version of Delta common stock was canceled; and many creditors received 62 to 78 cents on the dollar, better than many reorganizations, for what they were owed. On the other hand, the airline is still flying, employees will get some cash and equity, and it revealed a new logo today. Look at the Delta Website later tonight or tomorrow to see how it updated what it calls its "Widget," the delta-shaped symbol that appears next to the name.

This is an update from yesterday's post on last night's meeting held by the Federal Aviation Adminstration on its airspace redesign plan. Residents of some areas of Philadephia and its suburbs west and south of the airport let the FAA know how they think they'll be affected by changing takeoff patterns from PHL. Find our report in print and online here. For detail on the airspace plan, click here

United Airlines raised its highest-priced tickets, the type used by business travelers who can't plan far in advance, by $25 to $50 one way, JP Morgan Securities analyst Jamie Baker reported this morning. Unrestricted walk-up fares were up $50, while the next price teir down, tickets that require advance purchase and are on a limited number of seats, were up $25. Baker said in a note to investors there's only a "fair probability" that other carriers will match, which means United would back down.

Surely travelers who plan on flying out of the country this year and need a new or renewed passport have heard: It's taking forever. Or is it? We have reason to believe the situation is improving. The State Department and everyone else in the travel business has been warning that it can take up to 10 weeks to renew by mail. Here's the surprise: We received a new passport in less than four weeks from the time it was mailed (first class). Perhaps it helped that it was mailed to a P.O. box in Philadephia. So let's hope the passport folks are clearing the backlog, which was caused primarily by new rules, requiring all travelers entering the country by air to have a passport.

Here's another surprise: New passports are beautifully illustrated with American icons and landscapes. A line from the Declaration of Independence, the preamble to the Constitution, an eagle, Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell, mountains, farmers, herds of longhorn cattle and a Native American totem pole, it's all there and more. Just looking at it the first time is fun.

If you live in or near Philadephia or a few other large cities, you can go to a passport service center for same-day service. The Philadelphia center is in the U.S. Customs House, 200 Chestnut St. in Center City, but you need to make an appointment Here's a link to the State Department passport home page And please tell us what your experience with getting a passport has been.

US Airways plans to keep flying throughout next winter between Philadelphia and Dublin. The service has only been seasonal before. Read a little more here

Repercussions can occur when companies give big bonuses to senior executives soon after they've asked for sacrifices from the rank-and-file. A week ago, US Airways pilots set up informational picket lines at PHL, demanding management give back to employees some of the pay and benefits they gave up, twice in three years, to help get the airline out of bankruptcy. American Airlines pilots now are taking a turn, seeking raises to make up for concessions when the carrier was losing money. Read what the piolts and American's management have to say in an AP story

There is intrerest in Philly's suburbs to create a regional authority to run PHL and other airports in the region, as a way to try to ease congestion and spread out traffic more. Legislation has been introduced in the Pennsylvania legislature by Rep. Bryan Lentz from Delaware County. In the meantime, New Jersey is already part of just such an agency, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which runs the three big airports in the New York area. Now the Port Authority is expanding its reach to an upsate New York airport. Read an AP story about it here.

Look for some news in the next couple of weeks from US Airways and Southwest, PHL’s two largest airlines in numbers of passengers.

Southwest will be up first, with chief executive Gary Kelly in town Wednesday night and Thursday at the invitation of the Temple University School of Tourism and Hospitality Management. Perhaps the airline will take the opportunity to reveal plans for the additional flights from PHL that it says it wants to start.

On May 15, US Airways will hold its annual shareholders meeting at the Radisson Warwick Hotel in Center City. Look for some pilots in uniform and few of the airline’s other 5,600 PHL-based employees to show a keen interest.

Many Delaware County residents have made it clear how much they despise the Federal Aviation Administration's proposal to change the way airplanes take off from Philadelphia International Airport. Far less has been heard from those who may benefit from the Philadelphia-New York-New Jersey airspace redesign plan. They would be the 31.5 million travelers who flew in or out of the airport last year, as well as the 34,000 folks, many of whom live in Delaware County, whose jobs depend on the airport

The airspace plan calls for directing some flights to make turns just after takeoff, carrying them over residential areas on both sides of the Delaware River. Political leaders in Delaware County have stayed on their message of opposition, using experts who dispute the FAA's determination that the "environmental impact" of the flights -- mostly the noise of jets overhead -- won't be too severe.

In an unusual move, the FAA revised the airspace plan in the last two months, cutting in half the number of flight paths over populated areas. The FAA also notes that any change in the paths means some people will hear less noise than they do now, a benefit pretty much lost in the cacophony. The revisions haven’t diminished the opposition, based on the number of citizens booing and vilifying FAA officials at last week's public meeting on the plan in Tinicum Township.(Read about the meeting here.

The point of creating more pathways in the sky, of course, is to reduce flight delays at Philadelphia and four New York-area airports. Between them, PHL, Kennedy, Newark and LaGuardia usually finish in the bottom five for U.S. airport on-time performance. So the FAA had a dilemma when it started working on this almost a decade ago: Ignore projections that even more people will be flying in the future, or look at a variety of ways to move traffic more efficiently.

Building new runways or using satellite navigation to replace World War II-era radar for air-traffic control may help speed up takeoffs, but those solutions are years away. So in its slow, bureaucratic way, the FAA carried out its national mandate: find ways to accommodate the demands of airlines and air travelers. It was inevitable that the noise would be heard in someone’s backyard.

Perhaps, though, the notion of our backyard needs to be enlarged to include a region whose economy depends in good measure on the quality of its air service. Philadelphia’s tourism trade and other industries can’t thrive without dependable airlines and a decent airport. And low-fare airlines that have saved Philadelphia travelers millions of dollars through competition simply would not be here without the freedom to schedule as many flights as their customers want.

Several other airlines do it, but until now, US Airways had resisted the urge. PHL's biggest player is testing a $2 per-bag charge for curbside check-in at three Florida airports, Jacksonville, Orlando and Tampa. No decision has been made yet on whether to extend it to PHL and other larger stations in the US Airways system. The charge is cash only and does not include a tip to the skycap, who also can issue a boarding pass. We always tip the skycap and will continue to do it, even if we're in an airport, or on an airline that charges. But if the self-service check-in kiosks are working, and the lines aren't long, even $2 per bag could make us consider schlepping them inside.

We're curious what you think of this kind of charge by airlines. We haven't found a good Website that rounds up all the airlines' charges for things that used to be free. Please tell us if you know of one. The best way to make sure you're getting policies directly from the airline is to go to the carrier's Website and use the search function, or drill down until you find them. Also let us know of anything that has cost extra but has been rescinded, such as US Airways dropping the $25 charge for a pasenger with a confirmed ticket to stand by for an earlier flight.

Look for some heavy promotion in coming days of restricted advance-purchase fares to Columbus, Manchester, Pittsburgh, Providence and Raleigh/Durham -- as in $29 or $49 one-way plus taxes. As usual, the deep discounts came from Southwest first, with US Airways and others matching.

In the same vein, AirTran announced one of its two-day sales, this one for its busines-class service, with one-way fares starting at $109 plus taxes. Tickets have to be bought by the end of the day Friday.

Yes, we know JetBlue Airways doesn't serve PHL. But it is a pacesetter airline, having raised the standards for in-flight service and is very popular with its customers. David Neelman, the founder and CEO for nine years, was replaced today by Dave Barger, the president and experienced airline operations guy. Opinions vary whether the move is directly related to the widely reported service meltdown JetBlue had Feb. 14 at its Kennedy hub. Read what Neelman and others say in an AP story.

Planning a trip to Europe in a few years? Southwest Airlines CEO Gary C. Kelly was in the city this week and had a comment that may interest you. See what he had to say about the airline's plans for PHL in our Inquirer story

Delta is taking a turn at raising fares, revealing that it raised many of its domestic prices $5 each way last night. One of the older legacy carriers or another has tried seven times this year to raise fares but has succeeded in getting the rest of the industry to go along only twice. Southwest says it won't match this one, which increases the chances it won't stick,

One of the great frustrations of many travelers flying from PHLis finding a place to park a car. Especially at school-vacation time, both the economy lot and the daily-fee garages can be full, forcing the panicked driver to roam the roads around the airport looking for a private lot. Leaving the car at home and using public transportation is an option, but isn’t practical for most people.

The best way we’ve found to deal with the problem is to use one of more than a dozen off-airport lots that surround PHL, on Route 291 (Industrial Highway) and on Bartram, Essington, Island and Passyunk avenues. These privately operated lots always seem to have space available, and they have the great advantage of taking advance reservations. Unlike PHL’s on-airport lots and garages, the off-sites can be booked and the fees paid in advance on the Web using a credit card.

Rates for off-airport lots are competitive with the $9 a day in PHL’s economy lot. The daily fee can range from about $6.50 to $15 a day, but if you make a reservation online, there’s usually a one-time service fee of $5.

The most comprehensive airport parking Web site we’ve found is — what else — www.airportparkingreservations.com. Another one is www.parkrideflyusa.com. They have long lists of U.S. and Canadian airports that are part of their networks. When you do a Google search for “airport parking reservations,” you will find those two, and other sites with different addresses that link to the first.

You can also find Web sites for individual parking-lot operators at PHL and elsewhere — if you know their names. We have been unsuccessful in navigating to airport-parking sites from the larger online travel sites, including Expedia and Orbitz. But that may just be our lack of time and patience to keep drilling until we find them.

Tom Lombardi, the Suffield, Conn., entrepreneur who runs airportparkingreservations.com, says his site has 200 parking lots at 65 airports in its database, including eight near PHL. Business has boomed at PHL since Southwest started three years ago and parking became tighter. Travelers tend to use off-airport lots regularly after one experience of “going to the economy lot, and it’s full, and the sweat starts,” Lombardi says.

The off-airport lots may be a little farther from the PHL terminals than the airport economy lot, including some that are a mile or two away. But they have another advantage: service. Some parking operators have valet service, driving you in your own car back and forth. Most have shuttle buses that in our experience pull up behind your car, and not to a bus stop a hundred yards away, within a few minutes of your arrival.

Every time we’ve used one of the lots and have more than one bag, the shuttle-bus driver has hopped off and helped us. We always carry $1 bills for tips to encourage the practice.

Last week’s post “Our air service backyard,” prompted as many comments as any topic we’ve put on the blog. Most of them attacked the point we made. We’re glad someone cares and invite you to keep ’em coming.

US Airways’ dismal March performance, in contrast, elicited no response. Was it a case of “So what else is new?” The late-winter weather and US Airways’ bungled switch to a new computer system caused so many delays it pushed PHL near the bottom of the list of the 32 largest airports for on-time flights. Systemwide, the airline finished the month with the worst on-time performance and the greatest numbers of misplaced bags and complaints to the U.S. Department of Transportation among major carriers.

A traveler reported exceptionally long lines at Terminal D security at PHL this morning. Turns out, the lines were longer than normal at all the terminals, according to airport and TSA officials. At D, the problem was one of the four X-ray machines was out of order. Elsewhere, the only explanation offered was it was a Monday, when the number of business travelers is usually the greatest, and many students at the region's numerous colleges also were flying home for the summer. TSA says it had a full staff. You can always tell us about your experience by posting a comment.

US Airways held its annual meeting in Philadelphia this morning, providing CEO Doug Parker another opportunity to apologize for the lousy planning management did before turning on a new computer reservations-and-ticketing system on March 4. Anyone remember what happened? The meeting was sparsely attended, with the only questions coming from two union officers who represent airport ticket agents, and, as usual, Evelyn Y. Davis, the investor-gadfly who goes to dozens of annual meetings to challenge certain corporate governance practices. Read the early version of our story here.

The University of Michigan's annual survey of customer satisfaction with several industries, including airlines, was released today. It had some results that may be a surprise to PHL-centric fliers. Airlines finished next-to-last, while cable and satellite TV providers came in last, but overall, the industry improved nicely in the 2007 ratings compared with last year. The airlines had a score of 63 out of 100. Here's how the major carriers finished: Southwest, 76; Continental, 69; US Airways and Northwest, 61; American, 60, Delta,59; and United, 56. More information about the survey is in a U of Michigan news release.

If flights are delayed in good weather this summer, here's one explanation: The number of domestic and international flights and the number of seats airlines have for sale will be up. Last summer, the same stats were down compared with 2005, mostly because airlines in Chapter 11 or just coming out of it were trimming service. Remember how much fares increased last spring and summer? That was a function of fewer seats for sale.

The eSkyGuide, an American Express publication, says that the number of domestic flights will be up 2.1 percent and international flights will increase by 2.4 percent. Low-cost carriers will be responsible for much of the growth -- they will be offering 8.7 percent more flights this summer compared with 2006. The guide says the low-cost airlines now account for 19 percent of all flights and 27 percent of all available seats.

This may appear to be more inside-the-airline-industry information than you really need, but we think it's worthy of a minute of your time. Southwest Airlines has signed a 10-year agreement with Galileo, a British company that operates one of the world's largest airline reservations systems. The deal will put Southwest's fares on the computers of thousands of travel agents in North America. Southwest has had a more limited agreement with Sabre, a U.S. company that is another of the other major operators of a "global distribution system," or GDS, for agents.

As Web-savvy travelers know, Southwest's fares and schedules aren't in the other big online travel services for consumers, including Expedia, Orbitz and Travelocity. Southwest has never thought it was worth the fees those services charge. What's more, Southwest.com is one of the most popular Web sites of any kind. It accounts for 70 percent of Southwest's ticket sales, and ranks not far behind the big three sites that serve multiple carriers in the number of visitors it gets. A deal with Galileo will put the great majority of Southwest's fares in front of agents who use its GDS. And Road Warriors may really benefit. Travel agents still sell half of all airline tickets, and about half of all business travel is managed by corporate travel departments that use agents. Despite the flocking of airline customers to the Web to book and plan their own travel over the last decade, thousands of companies continue to use agents in one way or another, either having them book trips or serving as monitors of travel policies.

Federal regulators are considering rules that would more accurately reflect delays of flights stranded on runways after they leave an airport gate. Read a Bloomberg News story about the plans here.

Tell us if this sounds all too familiar: Employees at several of the largest U.S. airlines are sharply at odds with the men who run their companies over how much money both groups should be making. Now that most carriers are profitable again, after four years of losing billions, the workers say it’s time they got back some of the billions in pay and benefits they gave up to help their companies survive after 9/11. The execs disagree, of course, saying that despite some managers getting fat bonuses, their financial condition remains too fragile to give everyone a raise.

The odds are low that the workers will get what they want any time soon. Most of the airlines’ concessionary labor contracts — signed under the threat of destitute carriers saying “do this or we’ll all be out of jobs” — aren’t due to expire for several years. And the process of signing new contracts in the airline and railroad industries is tedious and time-consuming. (You may have seen The Inquirer's May 13 story on Amtrak workers who who have been without a contract for seven years.

But what’s going on is what Kevin P. Mitchell, chairman of the Business Travel Coalition, the Radnor group that represents corporate travel managers, calls “a big storm brewing.” Across the land, there are large knots of unhappy airline employees who aren’t comforted by the fact that they still have jobs while more than 100,000 of their former colleagues don’t. On Thursday, thousands of union members from the airlines and other transportation trades staged a rally in Washington, protesting a long list of complaints about management and Bush administration policies. Among their gripes is the dismantling of defined-benefit pension plans allowed by bankruptcy courts when airlines have been in Chapter 11.

For months, pilots, flight attendants, baggage handlers and others have put up informational picket lines at PHL, other airports and wherever airline executives gather. In the last week, employees have spoken out at shareholders’ meetings of US Airways Group Inc. in Philadelphia and AMR Inc., American’s parent, in Fort Worth, Tex. Jack Stephan, the pilots’ union chairman at US Airways, saw it this way after the gathering: “We wouldn’t have a US Airways, and we wouldn’t be having an annual meeting today, without the pilots’ investment.” At American’s meeting, the Transport Workers Union presented an online petition with 17,000 signatures objecting to the company’s executive pay pratices in light of concessions the rank-and-file have made.

Naturally, airline executives say that the unions are making unrealistic demands for a return, all at once, of the concessions they made. US Airways and American’s CEOs noted at the meetings how much employees received in profit sharing last year. And independent observers point out how much debt most carriers have.“The big concern is the airlines’ balance sheets are still a disaster this far into an economic recovery,” Mitchell said. “If wages go back up now, in the next downturn, some carriers may not make it.”

Should airline customers care about these issues? What we know is that in any business, disgruntled employees eventually mean poor service.

As always, tell us what you think.

Do you recall when a free breakfast, continental or otherwise, became standard for many mid-priced and even lower-priced hotel chains? In Europe, some offering of food in the morning has been expected of hotels for decades. In this country, we first recall Hampton Inns started the trend in the mid-1990s, although we're sure those in the hotel business will correct us if we're wrong. What was first just cofee and doughnuts has, fortunately, morphed into decent spreads in most chains.

So who can be surprised by the results of the YPB&R/Yankelovich Partners 2007 National Travel Monitor, an annual study by a longtime collector of travel industry data. The survey found getting breakfast included in the room rate influences the choice of hotel for 49 percent of leisure travelers and 53 percent of business travelers. In a different question, almost two-thirds of the Road Warriors found a hotel that includes breakfast in the rate was very or extremely desirable. If you stay in four- or five-star hotels, chances are breakfast won't be included but corporate travel managers with lots of business under their control often are able to negotiate rates that do include it. Coffee anyone?

J.D. Power and Associates, best-known for its consumer-satisfaction surveys on autos, does the same for airports and airlines. The 2007 results for PHL were released this morning and they may surprise -- perhaps even shock -- some travelers. PHL baggage service received a score of "better than most," the second-to-the-highest ranking, putting it in a tie with baggage service at Atlanta, Chicago O'Hare and Detroit, and a notch below Dallas/Fort Worth and Newark. Overall, PHL had the same score of "better than most," or four on a one-to-five scale. Just as curious, three airports that often get good reviews in other surveys, Denver, Minneapolis//St. Paul and Toronto, finished in last place among the largest airports (those with 30 million or more passengers a year).PHL had one "among the best" rating, for its food-and-beverage offerings.

All of J.D. Power's satisfaction scores can be found on its Web site.. Airports and airlines are under the Travel tab. More than 10,000 travelers participated in the study. Please let us know what you think of this survey (just the airline and airport stuff, not your car, please!) and other simiilar consumer research about airlines and airports.

The U.S. and Chinese governments say they want to open up the air-travel market between the countries. You may recall US Airways would like a PHL-Shanghai route, and this development greatly improves the airline's chances for a once-daily roundtrip, starting in 2009. Read the AP story here

Read the warnings about what to expect this holiday weekend and all summer on the roads and at PHL in today's Inquirer story

We suspect that most of the readers of this space have been through the TSA security process at PHL so many times you've lost count. For those who needed a reminder about what not to bring on an airplane these days, the TSA did a briefing this week. What TSA said may help explain some of the long security lines at PHL recently. Read more in today's Inquirer story.

"A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you're talking about real money." That notable line, attributed to the late Sen. Everett Dirksen of Illinois in reference to the Pentagon budget, also can be applied to the capital investment needs of airports, according to the folks who run them.

Airports Council International-North America, which represents the governing bodies of U.S. and Canadian airports, including the City of Philadelphia, estimates that its members must invest real money - $87.4 billion from 2007 through 2011 - to keep pace with the projected growth in passenger demand. Without putting money into new runways, terminals and gates, the busiest airports are going to get more congested and more flights will be delayed, the group said in a study. Travelers may understand the needs better after this summer. If thunderstorms delay many flights, 2007 could be worse than 2000, which the group said in a statement "had the dubious distinction of being the peak year for air-travel delays." Weather is the principal cause of flight delays, which averaged 51 minutes last year and are expected to be 53 minutes this year.

Philadelphia International Airport's capital-investment plans are a small slice of the $87.4 billion. The airport expects to spend between $600 million and $1 billion on projects from the start of fiscal 2008 on June 30 through fiscal 2011. Among improvements already under way are enlarging Terminals D and E with new ticketing lobbies, security checkpoints, retail shops and a food court, and lengthening the north-south runway to accommodate larger airplanes.

The vast majority of money spent on operations and capital improvements at Philadelphia and most other airports comes directly or indirectly from airline customers. The $4.50 charge for each departure that's part of the price of your ticket is one source of the airport's revenue. Another source is the federal tax on each airline ticket, which goes into a trust fund to pay for runways, taxiways and air-traffic control. But most of the money to keep the lights on and build new facilities comes from the airlines and other airport businesses in the form of rent, landing fees and other charges. So it's baked into price of a ticket or any other product or service you pay for at the airport.

US Airways changes .... US Airways has had a hard time keeping many of you happy this year, mostly because of its botched switch to a new computer reservations system in March that caused delays and cancellations. Recently, the airline has used its every public utterance - news releases, interviews with senior executives, employee newsletters - to ask for forgiveness and patience as it tries to improve things. Here are some examples of what the company says is under way:

For all travelers, US Airways is installing new software on its self-service airport kiosks, which didn't work well, or at all, after the computer switchover. Look for that work to be finished by the end of June. For its most frequent fliers, those with Preferred status in the Dividend Miles program, US Airways dropped a $25 fee that had been charged to change a reservation on the day of departure. Software was upgraded, too, so that three times a day a sweep is done of all passengers' records. The program looks for Preferred members who have reserved coach seats on flights that also have open first-class or business-class seats, and sends the members an e-mail after each sweep, telling them if they get to move to the front of the plane.

-

Advertising messages aimed at business travelers are so ubiquitous that they often escape our view without us even realizing they were there. Now US Airways is testing a new way to reach you, using the seatback tray table on some of its jets to feature columns from BusinessWeek magazine. The columns will run down the left side of the tray table, with the rest of the surface in this first phase covered by a US Airways Vacations ad. The campaign comes from a New York agency, Brand Connections, which teamed up with BusinessWeek to reach travelers at a time they have few other distractions -- and can't talk on the phone or send text messages, says agency CEO Brian Martin. US Airways is the first airline to buy the idea and is using them on 20 of its planes

The tray table has become a popular place to advertise, and Martin says the vast majority of people who pull down the table in flight remember the ad message. But when Brand Connections used focus groups to test a BusinessWeek column next to a traditional ad, consumers said they looked at them 3.4 times longer than those without a column. And to think, we heard a rumor that print media was dead!

International airline traffic has been growing at a faster rate this year than U.S. domestic traffic, particularly for carriers serving the Middle East and Africa. Read a news release from the International Air Transport Association about results for the first four months of 2007 here.

The widely reported story of a case of a rare form of tuberculosis has an airline connection. Read an updated AP story published Thursday (5-31) here . Air France reponded to the situation, saying it is contacting passengers who were on its flight with the man infected, from Atlanta to Paris on May 12. The airline's statement is on its Web site www.airfrance.com .

The National Transportation Safety Board blamed an airline and the FAA in determining the cause of a Chalk's Ocean Airways crash in 2005 that killed 20 people. Here's the news story from today's Inquirer.

Philadelphia has managed to do something that most U.S. cities have not since Sept. 11, 2001 -- draw more visitors from overseas than it did in 2000. As you've probably heard, since 9/11, this country has made it much harder for business and leisure travelers, including citizens of European countries that are allies, to enter the country. Travel industry organizations have been ciritical of the federal government's visa requirements and the tedious, time-consuming welcome visitors get at international airports.

Despite that, Philadelphia had 434,000 overseas visitors (those from Canada and Mexico don't count in this measure) in 2005, compared with 390,000 in 2000, the Philadelphia Convention and Visitors Bureau says. Among major U.S. ports of entry, only New York, with about 12 times as many foreign visitors as there are here, also grew when 2000 is compared with 2005. For Philadelphia, US Airways increase in European service in recent years has helped draw more visitors here. But most of the credit for maintaining the market goes to the visitors bureau. It advertises the city and region in a vareity of ways in Europe, and several times a year, it hosts groups of European travel agents, tour operators and travel writers to show off the city. Apparently, many of the travel-business visitors like what they see, and recommend Philadelphia to their customers.

Read our story about US Airways most recent additions to its European flight schedule here.

The Internatioinal Air Transport Association announced plans today to take on what its chairman called its "toughest challenge" -- helping combat global climate change by cutting its carbon emissions to zero. The United Nations estimates that the global industry's "carbon footprint" is now about 2 percent of all emissions, and will go to 3 percent by 2050, based on the projected growth of air travel. But chairman Giovanni Bisignani, speaking in Vacouver to the group's annual meeting, said that won't do.

"In today's political reality that is not acceptable -- for any industry," Bisignani said. "We must aim high. Air transport must become an industry that does not pollute --zero emissions." Achieving that will require leadership from governments, the UN's International Civil Aviation Organisation, and "a technology leap" from aircraft manufacturers and fuel suppliers, he said. He promised airlines will do their part by making environmental concerns as important as safety and security.

This is an issue that U.S. airlines have said little about. If they have, they must be talking to themselves and not telling the rest of us about the efforts they're making. At the same time, European carriers -- and European businesses and consumers in general -- appear far more aware of the issues and what must be done to deal with themt. If that concerns you, tell us -- and the airlines -- about it.

The Department of Transportation reported April airline performance today. Read our story here.

American Airlines joined other major carriers in cutting the time limit for activity in a frequent-flier account to 18 months. Here's the page on the AA Web site with details. Read what one longtime observer of frequent-flier programs thought about the move and the way it was announced here

We have this news brief in print this morning: The Federal Aviation Administration has scheduled a public meeting June 27 at the Crowne Plaza Hotel, Route 70 and Cuthbert Boulevard in Cherry Hill, to hear comments about its airspace redesign plan for the Philadelphia and New York areas. The meeting, scheduled for 6:30 to 9 p.m., was set at the request of members of Congress from New Jersey, who complained that hundreds of their constituents were not able to get into a similar May 1 meeting in Tinicum Township for lack of space. The airspace plan, which could change takeoff patterns from Philadelphia International Airport, has generated opposition in parts of Delaware County and South Jersey because of the potential increase in aircraft noise in residential areas. The FAA expects to complete its study of the plan in late August

The Transportation Security Administration and the airlines disagree over how much carriers should be paying for security services. Read more here.

The State Department and the Homeland Security Administration said today they're relaxing the rule requiring passports of U.S. citizens traveling to Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean and Bermuda, because of the backlog of applications. More detail was in print in this story today, which was written before the announcement.

It's going to be a long night at PHL. Read what we've prepared for tomorrow's newspaper here

Last week started in a minor key, with release by the U.S. Department of Transportation of data for airline on-time performance in April at Philadelphia International Airport and elsewhere. It wasn't good, as anyone flying could have guessed. But as the week went on, the skies brightened, with positive developments on a number of fronts that travelers care about. Of course, that was before the weather and FAA computer problems ganged up Friday to make a mess of flight operations at PHL and many other airports.

The reports on airline and airport delays for April (see the links posted on the blog early Tuesday) show a pattern that you can pick up if you read these things as often as we do. Remember how much rain we had in April? On-time performance nationwide slipped because of the weather. As usual, the New York airports and Chicago O'Hare were even worse than PHL. But PHL was hit especially hard because of US Airways' ongoing struggle to fix its reservations system. Those problems also have caused on-time operations to suffer in March and April at Charlotte, US Airways' largest hub, which usually finishes far ahead of PHL in the rankings. US Airways says service got much better in May, with 80 percent on-time arrivals systemwide. We await the next federal report.

Another bit of good news: The world's airlines, represented by the International Air Transport Association, say they will do their part to cut carbon emissions that cause global warming. The head of the group promised it would work with governments and aircraft manufacturers to improve technology to reach a goal of zero carbon emissions by 2050.

Those worried about the Federal Aviation Administration's airspace redesign plan for the Philadelphia and New York areas had reason to cheer, too. The FAA says it will hold another meeting to take public comment, from 6:30 to 9 p.m. June 27 at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Cherry Hill.

As the week ended, the feds - this time the State Department and Homeland Security - recognized what travelers had been telling them for months: They are ruining long-planned trips because they cannot reduce the backlog of unprocessed applications for passports. So they suspended the requirement for U.S. citizens to have passports to fly to and from Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean and Bermuda this summer. What will suffice until at least September is a government-issued photo I.D. and proof that you've applied for a new passport. The proof, officials say, can be found at the State Department's Web site within a few weeks of receipt of an application.

Our favorite bit of cheer was from the AAA Mid-Atlantic motor club, which surveys service stations from Virginia to North Jersey daily about their gasoline pump prices. AAA reacted with dismay in late April when fuel-price prognosticators said a gallon of unleaded regular could hit $4 a gallon this summer. No way, the club said, and that's what's happening so far, with prices hovering just above $3 in Pennsylvania and just under $3 in South Jersey. Let's hope it stays that way.

AirTran Airways' effort to buy Midwest Airlines is ready for a stockholders' vote. Read the AP story from the newspaper this morning.

AirTran extended its bid for Midwest Airline until Aug. 10. Read about it here

On a summer afternoon in the Northeast, delays for air travelers are mounting. Most flights in and out of PHL were operating on time earlier in the day, but as thunderstorms moved across the country and into the region, more flights are late. The biggest problems so far look like flights coming from the West and upper Midwest, according to phl.org and flightstats.com. Prepare for more as the evening approaches.

This is an impportant week for Midwest Airlines and its fight for control with AirTran. While these two carriers aren't among PHL's biggest, they both have been solid performers here for years. Read the latest AP story about them here.

Southwest Airlines CEO Gary Kelly says the airline's growth may not be as strong as it had hoped. That could slow down its plans to expand at PHL when it gets more Terminal E gates this fall. Read more here

The grassroots movement to get Congress to force airlines to provide better service, by adopting a passengers' bill of rights, has gotten some traction in Washington. Legislation is pending in the Senate that would require carriers to provide some minimal creature comforts --such as drinking water and working toilets -- if travelers are stranded on flights, away from a gate but not yet airborne. The legislation is opposed by one of the more powerful members of Congress, Rep. James Oberstar, chairman of the House aviation subcommittee, who wants the Department of Transportation to do the regulating in this area, and House hasn't acted on it.

This movement is a brainchild of Kate Hanni, a California real estate broker who was among those stranded for nine hours Dec. 29 aboard an American Airlines flight in Austin, Texas, that had been diverted because of weather. You may remember the horror stories, which were repeated by JetBlue Airways in February, and here and there by other airlines at various times.The Coalition for a Passengers' Bill of Rights has a Web site and blog and has generated signficant media coverage. This week, the group issued a report asserting that the airlines and DOT grossly underestimate how many flights wind up stuck on the tarmac for long periods, because flights that are eventually canceled aren't counted. The group used reports by the media and its own members about strandings to counter statistics, used by airlines and DOT, that show the number of such incidents is a tiny fraction of all flights.

The airlines and a some other groups that represent travelers' interests oppose the legislation Congress is considering. You can read what the head of the Air Transport Association, the big carriers' lobbying group, told the Senate transportation committee in April here.

We meant to post this earlier, a report blaming an old FAA computer for last week's air-traffic control meltdown, Here's the link to the print story today.

Perhaps PHL will be studied next, but in the meantime, here's an AP story about delayed flgihts at New York area airports.

US Airways has big dreams about additional international service from PHL. Read more here

If airline flights you took over the last 10 days were on time, you were among the fortunate few. We all heard the predictions that air travel was going to be rough this summer, with more flights scheduled and planes packed tighter than ever, and recent days have been doozies. The worst day was June 8, a Friday, when a Federal Aviation Administration computer failed, backing up air traffic across most of the East as severe thunderstorms were breaking out. Just one example: A blog commenter reported a five-hour takeoff delay on an American Airlines flight from Philadelphia — for his two-hour flight to Chicago. Matters weren’t much better on most afternoons last week as thunderstorms built up.

One way to track how airports and airlines are doing in real time is flightstats.com. The site is useful to see whether an individual flight is on schedule and to see the full array of operations for each carrier or airport. On the free portion of the site, you can check an airport’s departures or arrivals for the current day and one day before or after, and find a notation for how many minutes late each delayed flight was. You can see how grim the situation was at PHL on Thursday, when most flights before 9 a.m. were on time, a few more were late from 9 a.m. to noon, and half or more ran late in the afternoon. After 6 p.m., almost none was on time.

The weather made it a good time for another push by the Coalition for an Airline Passengers’ Bill of Rights, the grass-roots group (find its blog here) that wants Congress to require airlines to provide basic human comforts during long delays. The group issued a report last week asserting that airlines and federal regulators understate the number of flights that get stranded on the runways for hours. Good arguments can be made on both sides of this issue. The airlines’ views can be found at the Air Transport Association’s Web site, airlines.org

Despite the amount of coverage the media (ourselves included) give airlines, the majority of business trips are literally on the road. It’s logical, of course, considering how many people have opted since Sept. 11, 2001, to drive 300 miles or more to avoid the hassle of airport security and airline delays, and how many miles are put on rental cars by air travelers. That makes the price of filling a gas tank of acute interest, and the news has been good so far this summer in the Philadelphia region. Last week, the average price of unleaded regular continued a trend that started just after Memorial Day, dropping a penny or two a gallon on successive days, the AAA motor club says. By week’s end, the cost was below $3 a gallon in Pennsylvania, although it’s a little higher in the five-county area west of the Delaware. In South Jersey, the price was $2.89 a gallon.

The dreams of[ US Airways to make Philadelphia an even bigger and better international hub surfaced again Friday. The airline says it wants to start flying nonstop to two to four more cities in Europe and beyond, including some that have never been mentioned before by airport or airline officials. Among the places under consideration: Moscow; Istanbul, Turkey; Tel Aviv; Birmingham, England; India; and Japan. Read more in our story in Saturday's paper.

This is the week of the Paris Air Show, which means you will hear about a number of orders for new Airbus and Boeing jets. Yesterday, US Airways said it had ordered 92 Airbus jets, for delivery over the next decade. Read the full story we had in print here.

Boeing Co. had its own news this morning in Paris. See who's ordering its planes here

Souithwest Airlines CEO Gary Kelly says BWI is where it would have a code-share arrangement with ATA Airlines for connecting to international flights. Read more from Baltimore Sun

Here's thought No. 1 from Nutter: "The airport is critical, not only to the future of the city but to its impact on the region. ... I think it's pretty obvious there have been a number of challenging situations in airport operations. I'm fully examining all the performance issues out at the airport." So we know he appreciates what a powerful force PHL is, the source of close to 35,000 jobs and $14 billion a year in economic activity in the region, and how its reputation rubs off on the city.

Something else that's clear to us is that Nutter has already been talking to airlines and suburban politicians. He wants to find common ground with political leaders of South Jersey, Delaware County and, especially, Tinicum Township, where two-thirds of the airport's city-owned land is situated. County residents are concerned about aircraft noise and other effects of proximity to the airport. They are opposed to an FAA plan to use new takeoff paths over residenttial areas, and they want to know what Tinicum can expect if an additional runway is built along the Delaware as a way to reduce flight delays. While Nutter said he wants to work with suburban politicians, he also said, "It's critically important we improve our takeoff and arrival times, given our current record." Our thought: If reducing delays without having an impact on the neighbors were easy, it would have been done years ago.

Nutter said increasing international service will be another priority for him because of its ability to increase tourism and promote overseas trade. He said he would like to see direct flights to Africa from PHL (perhaps the longest of long-shot dreams), as well as the routes to Asia and additional service to Europe that US Airways seeks. The airport also needs to resolve the disagreement it's had with US Airways involving use of gates in Terminal A-East for domestic flights, Nutter said. US Airways continues to complain that it's hamstrung by the airport's decision to move Delta to A-East from Terminal E, so Southwest can expand its domestic service.

As for baggage, Nutter said: "We need US Airways to resolve the baggage-handling issues at the airport. My understanding is some improvements have been made, but more needs to be done."

One more area that Nutter says needs work is how efficiently the city handles requests for things like construction permits and installation of new equipment. That's another issue that frustrates US Airways' people, from baggage handlers up to the CEO.

In his call, one question Nutter did not want to address was this: Does mayoral front-runner want a new airport boss to replace Mayor Street's appointee, Charles J. Isdell? Nutter said he will only answer that question after the election in November. So if he wins, plan on us asking again.

United Airlines had a computer failure this morning that grounded all fllights for about two hours. United flights to PHL are running an hour or two behind schedule, but most other operations here are normal for a warm summer afternoon. Read an AP story about United here

The U.S. government is easing the passport rules for Western Hemisphere travelers. Read about the tedious process as it works now, in this morning's Inquirer.

Passengers on a Continental flight from Amsterdam to Newark had a horrible experience this week when a malfunctioning toilet overflowed. Hold your nose and read more here.

Al Taubenberger, who ran unopposed this spring in the Republican mayoral primary, has been thinking about the importance of PHL in the regional economy. After Democratic nominee Michael Nutter called to tell us his priorities for the airport, we asked Taubenberger to give us his. (We posted Nutter's comments two days ago.)

Like Nutter, Taubenberger said he supports US Airways' plans to add more international flights here. The GOP candidate said job growth in the city was a key plank in his platform, and while each new overseas flight would add only a few jobs, the service will help international trade. Because US Airways uses PHL as a hub, he said the city should help US Airways get as many airport gates as it needs. He was familiar with US Airways' objections to moving Delta into Terminal A-East to free up space in Terminal E for Southwest.

"There's no doubt Southwest has helped," he said. "But Southwest... is not the hub airline here...Southwest does not have international flights. It's more of a commuter and leisure airline."

Taubenberger said he wants members of Congress from the region to fight to help clear more air space for flights in and out of Philadelphia. Flights to and from airports in the New York and Washington areas have a higher priority to air-traffic controllers than do flights here, he said. But he said he needed to do more study before he expresses an opinion about the FAA's airspace redesign plan for the Philadelphia and New York areas, which is aimed at trying to reduce delays and is opposed by some political leaders in Delaware County and South Jersey.

If Taubenberger becomes mayor, he would ask Charles J. Isdell to continue as city aviation director. "He has done a good job under difficult circumstances, plenty of which weren't under his control," he said.

Great peril awaits anyone who dares to say these words: PHL flights are very largely on time today. The danger, of course, is that matters could deteriorate in a heartbeat as clouds build up later this evening. But throughout most of what's usually one of the heaviest travel days of the week, in the busy summer season, only a few dozen flights are seriously late, according to flightstats.com . We apologize if you're on one of the late ones, but for everyone else, have a nice trip.

The murky weather here and to the west has many PHL flights backed up for departure, with arrivals affected as well. We heard from www.joesentme.com (subscription Web site for frequent fliers) that Northwest was cancelling a number of flights, but here most of its flights have arrived and departed normally this morning.

Consumer Reports, the monthly magazine of Consumers Union, regularly asks its members to rate consumer products and services, and in the July issue now on newsstands it looks at hotels and airlines. For travel veterans, much of the CR articles will seem very basic, such as what to expect from a luxury hotel vs. a budget brand. But CR surveys' get thousands of responses from readers (more than 31,000 on airlines), so serve as a fair guage of what leisure and business travelers think.

There's far too much data in the reports to recount much of it in our space, but here's a hint: The highest ratings in the "fanciest" category went to Ritz-Carlton (Four Seasons apparently didn't get a minium of 150 responses). Among luxry brands, top marks went to Renaissance. Homewood Suites and Springhill Suites by Marriott tied for best upscale hotels, and Drury Inns/Suites was the top vote-getter in moderately priced, Microtel was rated best in budget lodgings, but ratings for all the budget brands were quite a bit lower than those in the other categories. One area to watch for are the room rates, because the surveys were done from January 2005 to April 2006. Some of the prices seem low to us, at least for urban hotels.

In the airline survey, the best ratings went to JetBlue, Midwest and Southwest. (The survey was done in February but included a followup in April after JetBlue's February service meltdown, which the magazine said didn't change the results). At the bottom of the list of best airlines were No. 17, America West, and No. 18, US Airways.

Pilots at Northwest say the airline's spate of cancellations over the last three days is due to a shortage of crews to fly its planes, the result of poor planning by management. Northwest says it was the weather, which caused enough delays that some pilots ran up against federal and union-contract rules on how many hours per month they can fly. Whatever the cause, it's up to management to fix it. And, as usual, it will be the front-line Northwest employees in airports and on board its planes who will bear the brunt of travelers' anger over the situation. Read more "he said / she said" in a Detroit Free Press story.

The FAA holds what is probably its final informational meeting tonight on its airspace redesign plan for PHL and New York area airports. Read this morning's story here

Southwest won't be flying nonstop between PHL and LAX or Oakland for awhile. Baltimore to California nonstop also will be out of the schedule by fall, although the changes may only be temporary. CEO Gary Kelly briefed analysts and reporters on that and other tweaks it made to its schedule as a way to cut costs at a time of high fuel costs and a sluggish economy. Two other local notes: one less PHL-Providence flight and one additional PHL-Nashville roundtrip. And the airline says in the fourth quarter it will announce changes in its seating and boarding policy, frequent-flier program and overall fare structure Read more in our story for print tomorrow, and in an AP story and check in again forr additional insight as the week goes on.

We've had a long day on the road and we're just now getting to staying in touch with readers. Here's a report on what's expected to be the last public meeting on the FAA's airspace redesign plan

Just now catching up. We've been traveling this weekend, and read an early edition of the NY Times. We'll be reporting more on security at PHL later today. Here's Sunday's national story. with some PHL information. Go to philly.com for the full story from Britain, with sidebars.

We're using a new way to deliver the Monday Road Warrior column that appears in print to you, the folks most interested in the topics. Instead of pasting all the copy here, we give you a Road Warrior link. Let us know if there are any objections.

The airlines' trade group, the Air Transport Association (ATA), has asked thhe Federal Aviation Administration to help ease air-traffic congestion in the New York area by treating airports primarily used by corporate planes the same way the region's three major commercial airports are. Why do PHL fliers care? Because PHL and New York share overlapping airspace, and flights coming or going to PHL from much of the west or north use the same higher-altitutde enroute facility, called New York Center, near Kennedy airport, as New York bound traffic does. This is a touchy issue these days because of debate in Congress on how to fund the FAA for the next five years. Airlines support a switch away from a percentage tax on ticket prices to a user-fee system in which all planes that use air-traffic control services would be treated alike. General aviation groups, representing business aircraft operators, charter services and recreational fliers, who now pay lower fees than larger passenger planes, are opposed to the user-fee idea because it would raise their costs, and they say they already pay their fair share. And, oh yeah, there's that issue of the FAA's controversial airspace redesign plan for PHL and New York.

In this latest iteratioin of the debate, ATA said traffic in the New York area is "completely saturated and near gridlock," and airlines have been forced to cancel hundreds of flights because of air-traffic constraints and summer thunderstorms. More than a third of all air-traffic delays nationwide last Thursay were in congested New York airspace, ATA said. ATA's solution: FAA should temporarily create additional airspace capacity by imposing proportional ground-delay programs -- that dreaded, 'We can't take off because we're in a ground hold, folks" -- at Teterboro, N.J., and other general aviatiion airports when ground delay programs are imposed on Kennedy, LaGuardia and Newark. Corporate jet flights represent about 30 percent of all New York approach-control activity, ATA said.

We just touched the tip of this iceberg of an issue, so stand by for more devleopments.

For a day when trouble was expected, operations were average today at PHL, with about a third of arriva'ls and a fourth of departures late.

The feds reported today on flight delays growing worse in May, for the fifth straight month, Complaints to USDOT about service, and the number of mishandled baggage reports the airlines too in May also were on the rise. For the statistically minded, here's more detail, including a few stats about PHL service, in a story from Bloomberg News with us contributing the local information. (Pay no attention to the word "yesterday" in the lead; this is a story slotted for tomorrow's print edition that you lucky online readers get to see first.)

Anyone who traveled in June could probably guess this: Airline on-time perfornance was poor and airplanes were jammed. The stormy weather was a big part of the delays, but the situation was made worse because most airlines' facilities are stretched so thin, recovering once delays start has become far more challenging. US Airways reported today that in June, it filled the highest percentage of available seats in its history -- 85 percent. Other airlines are reporting similar "load factors." But US Airways flights were on time only 62 percent of the time in June, and almost 3 percent of all its flights were canceled, a much higher percentage than normal.

Want to know why every seat was filled on your last airline flight, and the flight before that, and the flight before that etc.? One answer is in a Bloomberg News story this morning. If you're an airline investor, you should like what the story says. If you're a customer, maybe not.

Your link to today's Road Warrior column in print. Please note that in the column, the link for the flightstats.com page is a dead end. Thanks to an alert reader for pointing it out. Here's the correct link for airport wait times on flightstats.com

Air fares took another bump up over the weekend. Southwest led the way this time, with others matching. Read the AP story here.

In case you missed it in your trips to philly.com today, here's a link to a story we really enjoyed researching and reporting, on why many tradtiional bricks-and-mortar travel agents are prospering these days.

The last 24 hours have brought multiple announcements from airlines and Amtrak about technology upgrades designed to help the customer

Southwest Airlines said you can now use PayPal, the electronic-payment system owned by ebay, to pay for tickets on its Web site. Northwest Airlines announced a a similar deal with PayPal last month. A news release with more information can be found here

US Airways said today it arranged with Usablenet mobile to provide PDA and web-based cell phone users with content and functionality from its usairways.com Web site that is optimized for these devices. A customer now can buy a ticket from a handheld device, in addition to getting flight schedules. Find a news release about it with this link.

At Amtrak, the upgrade is at 44 of its busiest stations (which includes Philadelphia 30th Street, No. 3 in riders). The railroad has new Quik-Trak ticketing machines with better touchscreens, brighter graphics and ADA-compliant features that Amtrak says should help disabled travelers. Eventually, there will be 300 new machines in 150 stations. Find Amtrak's news release here.

And what, you say, does adding a big chunk to Philadelphia's Convention Center have to do with Philly Road Warriors? Some of you -- who knows how many -- live elsewhere and travel here, sometimes to meetings in the big building in Center City. And more conventioins and larger conventions mean more business for PHL, airlines and Amtrak. Here's the latest on expansion plans for the center.

What's the world's largest airline in domestic passengers carried? The answer is a surprise to many people: It's Southwest. Yes, the so-called no-frills discounter that few PHL fliers had ever used until it landed here in 2004 has become firmly entrenched in the No. 1 spot for the nation in the first four months of the year, compared with 2006. American Airlines continues to have more total passengers because of it also has international service, and along with several other major carriers, is ahead of Southwest in revenue and total passenger miles. But with Southwest carriying so much short-haul traffic, it has a big lead in domestic passengers. And the airline led the world in domestic traffic last year as well. That's a function of the U.S. air-travel market representing close to half the world's traffic, and seven out of the top 10 airlines in domestic passengers are all U.S. carriers.

For those who can't get enough of this kind of data, here's a link to the source of U.S. numbers, the Department of Transportation's Bureau of Transportation Statistcs. bts.gov. And another one to the International Air Transport Association stats for world rankings.

Among the reasons we've seen an increase in delayed flights this year is the number of flights airlines are offering. You apparently want to travel, and carriers say they're trying to meet the demand. For more about just how much air service is available in July worldwide, look for a news release from OAG (that once stood for Official Airline Guide) on this month's record number of seats for sale. You will find it under the same headline that appears at the top of this column. Here's a link to PR Newswire.

Today's Road Warrior column in print is just the sort we would like to do more of: It came from the suggestion of one of you. In this case Steve, also known as YHS. Read what we've found in the hunt for a service station convenient to PHL here

AirTran Airways gets its chance to make a presentation to Midwest Airlines' board of directors today. AirTran wants to buy Midwest, but Midwest's managers say they would be more profitable standing alone. Read more here

A US Airways flight from London Gatwick to PHL was diverted to St. Johns, Newfoundland today because of an ill passenger. It took off f again more than seven hours later. Read what we know here

US Airways -- and a bunch of other airlines -- have filed their applicationis with federal regulators for China service. US Airways says it will go PHL-Beijing roundtrip seven days a week starting in March 2009 if it wins one of these coveted route awards. Not included in this morning's story is a fourth carrier's application: United to China from Los Angeles and San Francisco. The other majors, American, Delta and Northwest, would go from their respective hubs, in Dallas, Atlanta and Detroit.

News about airlines seems to come in bunches and this week is a good example. Besides the announcements from multiple airlines that want routes to China, the carriers start reporting second-quarter financial results. American, Southwest and Continental are among the first up, with US Airways next week. Analysts say the industry did reasonably well from April through June, and with demand strong and capacity reduced by some airlines for the second half, money is likely to be made for the full year unless some big surprises occur. Look here for reports on the financials and other news here as the week progresses.

If you've flown recently, packed into another metal tube with practically every seat taken, this won't surprise you a bit: The major airlines began reporting second-quarter earnings this morning, and American, Delta and Southwest all made money. As expected, Southwest's profit went down vs. the same 2006 quarter. The reasons for the results: Fares have held up, with only limited discounting, and some carriers have trimmed or at least not added capacity (that means the number of seats available for sale). In the meantime, you folks just keep on traveling because you must or want to. The airlines' news releases, with more detail than most of you want, we're sure, can be found using the Web site links in the lower right-hand column of this page. For more detail about what Southwest is doing to cope, here a link to today's story in print about an employee buyout offer.

The crash of a A320 in Sao Paulo, Brazil. yesterday, has brought the issue of runway length into sharp focus. At just over 6,200 feet, the runway had been criticized by pilots and many others as dangerously short -- akin to landing on an aircraft carrier. Read today's update from the AP here

We will be following up with more about requirements in the U.S. for runways at commercial airports to (updated info) overrun areas (not arresting material) at both ends that can keep planes from ending up as this one did when they overshoot the runway. FYI, the last time we checked, PHL's runways had overrun areas at both ends, with one exception, and that was in the process of being upgraded..

The news about the Sao Paulo, Brazil, airport where a jetline crashed this week seems to be getting worse. Here's the latest AP dispatch from the scene.

No kidding, Herb Kelleher, the smartest guy in the airline business, steps aside as executive chairman of the most consistently profitable airline in the world, but stays on as an Employee (always capitalized at Southwest). Also, CEO Gary Kelly was given a contract for the next four years, and president Colleen Barrett said she also will step down from her post but stay on as an employee, Read the details of this surprising announcement today at Southwest.com's press release site. The release is the first one on the list. And here's a New York Times story on it

Common sense has prevailed at the Transportation Secuity Administration. The agency says it's stopped seizing 22,000 disposble cigarette lighters a day and will now allow them past checkpoints. The rule on breast milk also changed. Read more detail (about the lighters) than you thought you needed to know at here

Today's Road Warrior column is a roundup of news from the last week, Find it at this link.

We're on vacation for the next two weeks, so there will be little new posted. If something really big breaks, we won't be able to resist doing what all Road Warriors should do and actually take breaks. But look for us to resume regular posting the week of Aug. 6.

A Pennsylvania House committee holds a hearing in Ridley Township today on a proposal for a regional airport authority. Read more here.

US Airways was in the black again in the April-June quarter. Read about it here.