The US Airways Super Bowl, well sort of . . .

I was talking to our CFO, Brett McAllister who told me about a very interesting conversation he had with a sports-minded aviation consultant.

Phoenix is the main hub for US Airways (because it was the hub for America West, of course).  In the first round of the playoffs, the Arizona Cardinals dispatched the team from Delta’s hub (Atlanta), but in the next two rounds they beat teams from US Airway hub cities Charlotte and Philadelphia. In the Super Bowl they will play the team from what used to be US Airways’ main hub, Pittsburgh.  So, in a way, the Cardinals are vying not just to be champions of the football world, but champions of the US Airways system. 

Wonder if the folks in the marketing department of the carrier have caught on to this yet (I do know they have planes painted in the logos of both teams).

My World Series prediction turned out to be all wrong, but that won’t stop me from predicting that the Steelers will have a better defense against the Cardinal attack than Pittsburgh had against the US Airways decision to pull down its hub there.  Steelers, 23-17.

Filed under: Airlines, Airports, football

A few random thoughts for the New Year

Former U.S. Sen. Claiborne Pell died on New Year’s Day at the age of 90. He is best known for devising what is now called the Pell Grant program that has enabled so many students to attend college. What I remember him for though is that he always voted for cloture, no matter what the issue. When I worked on the Hill, a number of senators did this. It was rare that the Senate would not invoke cloture, and when cloture was not invoked it was a big issue. These days, even routine business is subject to cloture votes and cloture often fails. Cloture votes are often cast along party lines.

This is one case where it really WAS better in the old days.

I spent a lot of time watching bowl games. During the coverage of the Orange Bowl, they said that one of the teams traveled to the first Orange Bowl by steamship. How times have changed!  When I watch a bowl I think about the airport in the bowl city and imagine the concourse full of fans wearing their team’s colors as I wrote about in an earlier posting. Steamship travel had some romance to it, but this is a case when it really IS better today than the old days.

By the way, I oppose a college playoff; I think they should scrap the BCS and go back to the old bowl system. They can add a game the week after between the two top teams. That would give you a New Year’s Day (and New Year’s Eve, if needed) full of top match ups. This way USC, Texas and other top teams who feel left out can make their case to play in the final game, all on the same day. This is the idea being promoted by broadcaster Todd Blackledge, and I like it!

Filed under: Airports, football, politics

Irish football, cheap gas and what about an energy policy

I went up to Baltimore last Saturday to see the Notre Dame – Navy game.  It turned out to be a typical ND-Navy game, hard fought right to the end.  It featured monsoon-like rains in the fourth quarter and two straight successful onside kicks for Navy, the kind of thing that only happens in the movies.  Luckily for my Irish, we held them off.

The second most interesting thing I saw in Baltimore was gasoline for sale for $1.97 per gallon.  That’s a price that seemed impossible just a few months ago (I wonder what happens now with all those car dealers who promised someone who bought their car that they’d have gas for $2.99 per gallon for a full year.  Certainly over the summer, $2.99 seemed like a good price).

Anyway, it got me to thinking about a point I have made in this space before.  When oil was selling at more than $140 per barrel, it just seemed certain that this country would finally make those hard decisions necessary to not only achieve energy independence, but also to develop alternative sources of energy and other technologies and an energy policy worthy of the name.  The sort of thing that had been promised so many times before, and then was forgotten when prices came back down.

But as the price came down these past three months, first below $4, then below $3.50, then below $3, $2.50 and now, in some places, below $2, it seems almost like the idea of a real energy policy has disappeared into thin air.

If we let that happen, we will deserve what we get the next time prices spike, probably to $200 per barrel or more.  I’m no economist, but I am old enough to know that the recessions of the early 1970’s, the late 70’s and early 80’s, early 90’s and now 2008 were (and are) all accompanied by fuel price spikes.  I’m sure someone has written an academic book about why this is so; but all I have to go on are my own eyes.  It is undeniable that fuel price spikes and hard economic times go together like peanut butter and jelly.  By the way, if you look at those periods of history, they are came with enormous national security challenges.  It is all intertwined.

When will we learn?  If we don’t learn this time, when will we learn?  Certainly, in our industry, the impact of fuel prices is more than acute and lasts long past that time when prices retreat to what seem like more normal levels.

I watched President-elect Obama’s interview the other night on 60 Minutes. Steve Kroft asked him about this, and whether the lower prices have made the need to move on energy less important.  The President-elect’s answer was the right one:  he said that it has never been more important and that we can’t be lulled into a false sense of security on this because prices have come down some.  Music to my ears, and I hope he is able to make progress on this important issue.

In the end, the important issue really isn’t price alone.  It involves prices for sure, it also involves availability, it involves the environmental impacts, it involves national security, it involves business confidence, and it involves a whole host of things.  Oil price spikes are an indicator that bad times are upon us.  But the challenge isn’t just to avoid spikes, it is to develop and implement a real national energy policy that makes oil price spikes irrelevant.

I will be traveling to Panama later this week to attend the ACI-Latin America/Caribbean annual conference and look forward to reporting on events and trends from that fast growing region.

Filed under: Airports, Government policy, Notre Dame, Travels, football