Thread: Should UA De-Hub IAD? Some think so...

That one is easy. The Washington area is the 7th most populated metro area in the country, and growing like wildfire. Cleveland is at #29 and shrinking. Washington has some HUGE big-money industries in the area - obviously the politically-based stuff, but there's also a lot surrounding that. Major government contractors - Lockheed Martin, Boeing, you name it - either they have offices in the area, or they'll travel to Washington to meet with people in the Pentagon (or what have you). CLE? What do they even have? Best I can really guess is a few auto parts manufacturers (and I'm sure they aren't doing so hot) and I don't know... chili on spaghetti? Ok, that's actually really tasty. But you can't even compare the two.

Yes, there's also DCA. But a city that large can absolutely support a second (3rd if you include BWI) airport. NYC has JFK, LGA, and EWR. Chicago has ORD and MDW. SFO also has SJC and OAK. LAX has ONT and SNA and LGB and BUR. I could go on... either way, even if there is a loss *now*, the potential for the area is screaming at you!

I would also love to see more EU flights out of IAD (who wouldn't want more routes? That's the most fun part of an airline). But realistically, UA pre-merger was always focused more on Asia than it was Europe or South/Central America. Continental was the opposite. From a routing perspective, the merger really helped each other fill in the gaps. Oh, and that point about IAD and EWR being 200 miles apart? EWR and CLE were hubs under the same airline much longer before the merger. According to SHARES, they're just under 300 miles apart, and the only other hub they had was IAH.

Bottom line: CLE was doomed a long time ago.