Originally Posted by NuGuy

Heyas,

There are guys who "called in honest" who have horrible commutes.

There are "company men" who never called in sick in their career.

Who wants to make a guess which guy says "well, I fly by the book" as soon as you sit down and wears long sleeves. Who wants to make a guess which guy can make a 4 day trip seem like 8.

It's always the guys with long sleeve shirts. I swear, it's like a red flag.

Nu

Originally Posted by iaflyer

Anyone know the best way to get from the ATL airport to the Delta training center? I have to go for bounces tomorrow, so it's just an quick in-and-out of ATL, no hotel involved.

Originally Posted by KC10 FATboy

Ferd ...

I'm a new guy here but I'll throw out a possibility. Because lots of the people in those types of positions are Atlanta based and don't have to worry about such things.

Now with this bid, things could very well change.

To quote one Atlanta based pilot in the lounge the day the MOAB dropped, "I guess we had it coming...."

Originally Posted by scambo1

That is a gross overestimation. That is to get the ups policy and assumines everyone is a commuter.

I think the right way to look at is - NY has crappy wx, there have been morning cancellations so pax are backed up. So you cant get on your first flight and shortcalls have been used to cope with the commuter problems. Now you get positive space and because of this the IROP doesnt get worse and your flight operates and doesnt cancel with the resultant rebookings, hotel rooms, greenslips, etc. I just dont see how this has a cost. It is a benefit to the company and minor stress reliever to the pilot.

Originally Posted by Ferd149

Speaking of all about me saturday.............was anything done on the bids today? (It's MY first month under the southie system). NWA worked them on saturdays but not on sunday (don't know if the computer was left to just chug away or not).

Will we start seeing any results on Monday? Wait, or do they all come out together in one batch vs once a category at a time (ie 744B).

Ferd

Originally Posted by iceman49

Small point, but I think you meant the UPS policy of pos space for everyone would cost 24000 seats per year. The NW policy was if you had 2 backups and still could not get you to work...than they would pos space you over. The DL policy only works when you have lots of reserve...if the economy picks up and the percentage of reserves goes down....makes it much tougher to do the no commuting policy that effectively DL has.

Originally Posted by slowplay

Ahh, the classic class warfare..... How about never forgetting or misrepresenting Delta pilots. NEVER.

There are a host of bad assumptions in this thread.

First, there are over 3800 pilots flying out of Atlanta. Last number I saw only showed 2100 living withing a 2 hour driving radius. That means 1700 would be considered "commuters". Also, all those "senior" guys that you try to start class warfare with have seen the closing on the southside of BOS, MIA, MCO, ORD, IAH, DFW, MSY, SFO, PDX, SEA during the last 20 years. The North guys have a similar story. During that time there has also been a substantial reallocation of equipment from base to base that has caused a lot of displacements, many of which were during economic recession.

Second, the majority of the "ALPA guys" either are commuters or have in the past. The current MEC Chairman, Vice-Chairman, Treasurer, Secretary, Transition Coordinator, Negotiating Committee Chairman and two members, Comm Chair, etc, are all commuters and most were prior to doing ALPA work. I'm guessing they don't hate commuters as they are commuters.

Third, while this AE reduces the number of widebody seats in ATL, it's not the first time base realignment has happened. While mitigated by pilot retirements, Atlanta saw a very quick reduction in only partially replaced widebody positions when we parked the 56 TriStars and 15 MD-11's, replacing them with 21 767-400's and 7 777.

Fourth, PG is right regarding sick leave. It's for when you're sick, not for when you can't commute. Both north and south took huge sick leave hits in bankruptcy. Guess what, when we got less sick leave and/or were paid less for it, it's use went WAY down. That's a direct cost (savings) to the contract, and ignoring or excusing the use of sick leave as platinum days/commuter protection ignores that it costs (and did cost) all of us. For the whiners on this point, calling people "management stooges" for pointing out the facts reflects a lack of integrity and ignores the reality that we've been through.

Fifth, the group here is really good at attacking each other while ignoring the elephant in the room. Because of the reasons above, I'm very interested in seeing an "enhanced" commuter policy (I've been displaced just about as often as I've seen "entitlements" in my time here). That said, all the "pro-commuter" arguments in the world will fail when Congress panders and legislates a commuting policy based on the Colgan crash. What certain Senators want is draconian, and they don't appear to care that you're updside down in your house, have a sick family member, or a wife with a good job. They believe it is a choice.... It's not close to a done deal, but look at last week's Senate Aviation Safety hearing for what some of the rulemakers are thinking.

Originally Posted by CVG767A

A long time ago, I heard one flight attendant counseling another about a long distance relationship. "Never move for a man" was her advice. Inevitably, when the relationship was over, she would find herself living in a city where she had no ties.

My version of this advice is "Never move for an airline". We are more likely than not to be commuters at some point in our careers..

Previously Houston, Miami, and Cincinnati based, with no ties in any of them.