Delta Wants to Add 30 Gates in SEA. Currently Hiring in SEA..
Delta wants to almost triple its gates at the SEA airport, challenging market leader AS as the carrier expands its newest West Coast hub and jumping-off point to Asia.
“We’re making good progress on our discussion to upgrade the facility and to turn Seattle into a huge international gateway for Delta,” Chief Executive Officer Richard Anderson said on a recorded message to employees.
Delta, the world’s third-largest airline, is seeking 30 gates at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport in the long term, Anderson said on the Nov. 13 call. The airline currently has 11 gates, according to the airport, the largest base for Seattle-based Alaska.
Delta has been pushing into Alaska’s home turf for more than a year as the two fight for market share at an airport where the smaller airline now controls about 40 percent of the traffic. Atlanta-based Delta has designated Seattle as a hub from which to offer an increasing number of trans-Pacific flights.
Anderson’s message suggests Delta is pushing beyond a previously stated goal. In September, Seattle airport spokesman Perry Cooper said Delta wanted about 150 flights a day at the airport by 2017. That would require 19 or 20 gates, assuming eight flights a day from each one,
Delta Capacity
Delta could potentially operate 240 flights a day with 30 Seattle gates, Cooper said. Sea-Tac, as the airport is commonly known, determines how many gates to grant airlines each year according to formula using their number of outbound seats as of August, Cooper said.
“That’s one of the estimated opportunities there,” Cooper said by telephone. “But does that mean that somebody would use that many?”
Delta didn’t return a call yesterday seeking comment about Anderson’s remarks on the employee call.
At 30 gates, Delta’s Seattle operation would still be smaller than United Airlines’ hub in SFO, which often is seen as the dominant hub to Asia because of that market’s large Asian population. United operates from 32 domestic gates at San Francisco International Airport and shares 12 international gates with partner airlines in the Star Alliance,
Delta’s biggest West Coast base is now LAX where the airline handled about 6.89 million passengers in the year ended in July, according to the U.S. Bureau of Transportation Statistics. The airline’s Seattle total was 3.37 million people.
