[Nashville International Airport Development thread]

1 hour ago, Chato_reyes said:

They don't post board minutes until they're ratified at the next meeting, so those notes were from June. Last board meeting was July 20, so I'm sure it will be a hot topic next month. 

The email I got from spirit says they expect the deal to close in 2 years ago there could still be lots of moving parts. Sounds like the deal is equal parts fleet expansion and killing competition. AA could use jetblue as their springboard to the northeast and instead focus on flights to Charlotte, DFW, Phoenix, LA etc. And JetBlue would increase frequency to BOS, JFK/LGA, DCA, and obviously FLL. Spirit also just got slots at EWR and the new airline could compete with WN on MYR and even start service to ACY, I'm sure the fine people at the borgata are wondering where I've been.

I see. I’m kind of hoping the American/JetBlue NEA gets terminated as part of this merger. American needs to fix their own problems in the Northeast, it’s their own fault for giving up so many NYC slots over the last 20 years.

I also think they’d have to divest slots at EWR and FLL so I can’t see additional flights there. Maybe Las Vegas and/or Los Angeles will start on JetBlue from Nashville? 

Regardless, like I said above, I can’t see JetBlue increasing a ton out of Nashville because of Southwest’s dominance. Southwest will be running over 200 flights a day here eventually, and I wouldn’t even rule out as high as 300 in the long term. They need to bulk up in the southeast, and Nashville is pretty much their only option as Atlanta and Florida are too competitive for any type of 200+ flight operation. Plus, with Nashville’s rapidly growing Origin and Destination traffic and prime geographical location in the center of the eastern United States, it’s pretty attractive to put a large connecting operation like what they are doing in Denver.

Now if Southwest would just open a crew base here, it would be much easier to expand quicker…..

We’ll see what happens with JetBlue, this is gonna get interesting.

[Nashville International Airport Development thread]

2 hours ago, Chato_reyes said:

Combing through the June board meeting minutes:

New terminal is scheduled to open 1/17/23 with 24 screening lanes and the return of cartoonishly large led boards with departures and arrivals. IAF will open later in the year.

TN Rickhouse in C (where Starbucks used to be) is behind schedule but moving forward. 

Should be continuing progress by NES in relocating utilities along Donelson Pike as well. 

Anything about gate assignments?

I wonder what is going to happen now with the Frontier/Spirit merger dead and JetBlue acquiring Spirit instead. Wasn’t it rumored they were eyeing the satellite? I can’t imagine they (JetBlue) would grow much here with Southwest so dominate.

On that note, I was thinking, I really wonder how big Southwest wants to get here long term. They will take a good chuck of the gates in C/D/Satellite when all said and done, and honestly, I could totally see Nashville cracking the top 5 of their largest stations one day. 

[Nashville International Airport Development thread]

4 hours ago, downtownresident said:

Best shot for them is the Satellite concourse. The new international gates will also be common use, so they might be able to use some of those. D extension seems to be to replace the A concourse while that is being built out. 

I would agree, but I thought the satellite was for the likes of Frontier, Spirit, etc. I just want to know how big Southwest intends to get in Nashville. I believe it could be a top 5 station at some point if they play their cards right.

28 minutes ago, markhollin said:

Welcome to the forum, RSmith1902!    : )

Thank you. This seems like a more positive place to discuss Nashville airport improvements compared to elsewhere.

[Nashville International Airport Development thread]

I saw in the Southwest Airlines 2021 Q4 Earnings Call that Gary Kelly (in his final call as CEO) stated that Southwest is going to be picking up substantial gates in key cities such as Denver, Phoenix, Baltimore....... and Nashville.

What gates are they going to be taking here? I've heard a lot of rumors in the last few years that Southwest wants to grow to over 200 flights a day here and wants to set up everything from a crew base to a maintenance hanger. Is there any truth to this? I think it makes sense, considering the rapid growth of the area plus the fact that they don't really have a large station in the vein of Baltimore, Chicago, Denver, Las Vegas, Phoenix, etc, in the southeastern United States.

Does anyone have any information here?