Indy Travel

Virginia Postrel goes to town on the recently-revised Wright Amendment which keeps Southwest Airlines out of Dallas/Fort Worth airport. With new changes, travelers can now fly from Love Field to Missouri, which leaves “only” 41 states off-limits to Southwest. We’ll leave the details to Virginia–who’s a great advocate for customer choice–who exposes the dirty deals that airlines make to force each other into bankruptcy.

An air marshall fired a weapon on a jetway before an American Airlines flight could leave for Orlando. The story is developing.

The aerospace industry finally has some good news, and it’s the strides Airbus and Boeing are making in China. With big ($9 billion big) deals, the companies look good, but the deals are also raising questions about the future of aviation.

Airbus also struck a deal to supply 20 planes to a Chinese upstart. Three of the planes will be delivered by May 2006, when East Star Airlines will begin operations out of its home in central Wuhan. The deal counters rival Boeing’s success in tapping the Chinese market, which, Boeing says, will need 2,600 aircraft by 2025.

As Airbus and Boeing continue to spar, we look forward to the day when innovation will replace business wrangling in the aerospace sector. Instead of government subsidies or rights to contracts in China, the companies should be developing products that benefit airlines and passengers. Airbus should continue its work on the surprisingly–we’re told–comfortable and eco-friendly A380 super-jet. Boeing should pursue the speedy, fuel efficient, and passenger pleasing Dreamliner series. And both companies, rather than bickering with trade regulators, should consider what they can do to stop the growth of Bombardier and Embraer, two companies banking on a further increase in the point-to-point aviation model using regional jets.

We recently flew from St. Louis to Newark on an Embraer 145 in under two-and-a-half hours. Skipping a layover in, say, Chicago, Pittsburgh, Charlotte, or Atlanta, we sped along at over 30,000 feet, heading exactly where we needed to be. To call the new, Brazilian jets “regional” doesn’t describe how useful they are. Even Airbus-friendly Jetblue decided to add a set of Embraers to its fleet, citing passenger demand on certain routes. With less-than-full planes, Jetblue was–as they themselves say–flying TVs around the country. Razor-thin profit margins on low-cost carriers demand the kind of 70-110-seat flights Embraer can provide: it’s easier to fill 100 seats than 150.

Will the deals Boeing and Airbus make in China give them the capital to continue innovating? That depends on how popular flights out of Wuhan prove to be.

The NY Times makes holiday shopping easy with a shortlist of new travel books. The paper correctly identifies most of the books as funny, interesting, and gimmicky. Three tales retrace the steps of saints, with requisite shock and amazement at the funny customs of “foreigners”. Though some of the books are less than stellar, the Times does recommend two heavyweights: the wonderful Best American Travel Writing 2005 and Rowing to Alaska: And Other True Stories. These books weave together a sense of place, a story, and an author without gimmicks: They’ll inspire you to get back on the road.

Manny Fernandez lovingly details a little-known New York landmark: the Hotel Carter. We’ve never been, but it sounds an awful lot like an awful lot of places we have stayed. As employee Elaine Nguyen puts it:

“We’re not a four-star or five-star hotel,” she said. What they are, she said, is “the best bargain for the location.”

Best bargain for Times Square, eh? Do we get a discount for reeking of kabobs and dealing with pedi-cabs?

The IHT reports that British Airways plans to cut up to one third of its management. CEO Willie Walsh, who turned Aer Lingus into what some consider the first trans-Atlantic low-cost carrier, “said the cuts were designed to make British Airways a ‘more competitive and efficient airline.'” BA is moving to retain its position as one of the top European airlines, and pending open skies agreements are sure to amplify the benefits of the job cuts.

We’re hoping the management cuts allow the company to continue the service it’s noted for–without trimming its route network. BA’s greatest strength has always been its Heathrow-based and wide-reaching hub-and-spoke system. With management, rather than flight attendant or pilot, layoffs, BA should make a smooth and (ultimately) morale-boosting transition into the second century of flight.

Gridskipper points us to geography-dork heaven: Urban Cartography. With news-worthy GIS maps (like a Google map of Hurricane Rita, above) and studies of urban planning (including reviews of books like “Principles of Urban Structure“), the site offers up plenty of in-depth info about what makes cities (and people) tick.

As the NY Times aptly points out, history-rich and French-speaking Quebec City feels like a ville from the Old World not a modern Canadian metropolis. With a favorable exchange rate and off-season prices, you can snag a reasonably-priced, short European vacation without all that jetlag and Euro sticker shock…

NY Times correspondant Ian Fisher yucks it up as he recalls his Vespa-piloting adventure through Italy’s capital. Trying to navigate the city’s notorious traffic using GPS, Fisher learns that Italians don’t appreciate gadgets the way Americans do. After attempting to follow his mini-computer’s directions, Fisher realizes it might be better to just ask for directions. Thus:

the truth is, not even G.P.S. can drain Rome of its chaotic soul. I used it the other day to get to an interview at the courthouse on Piazzale Clodio. My Quest drew a decent route, but I still overshot an exit. To get back, I turned the scooter against traffic, hopped a curb onto the sidewalk, then onto the right route. This is all illegal, but completely normal for scooters. Ten uneventful minutes later, a little checkered flag went up on my G.P.S. signaling that I had successfully reached Piazzale Clodio. Now where the heck was the courthouse? I didn’t see anything that looked remotely like one. I had to ask someone.

Also in Rome: Euro-hippies will have to find a new piazza to fill with flaming devil sticks and hacky sacks now that Rome’s mayor is cracking down on bohemians in Piazza Navona. More interestingly, the mayor’s name is Walter…

Our favorite snippy flight attendant, James Wysong, follows up his thoughts on airplane meals with some refreshing advice about airborne water. He’s got some good tips, even if his journalism isn’t exactly hard-hitting:

A nutritionist once told me that if I mixed water with one-quarter cranberry juice or apple juice, I would retain the water longer and receive more of the benefits. I don’t know if that’s true, but ever since I started doing it, I have had considerably less jet lag and have woken up feeling more energetic the next morning.

Wysong doesn’t know if it’s true, and God knows he’s not getting paid to find out, but he’s still telling you about it…