Any Dulles Commuters?

jtrain609

Antisocial Monster
Are there any Dulles commuters here? How much of a knife fight is the jumpseat going into and out of Dulles?

Also, for the CRJ-200 drivers; what normally causes you to be weight restricted and thus, unable to take a jumpseater?

amorris311, jynxyjoe
 
Yep, I commute out of IAD. It's always a hassle trying to get the jumpseat. Listing and getting CASS approved always seems to take way more work than it should at the A gates.
 
IAD/DCA to EWR...that is until xjt opens that Dulles base. IAD/EWR is always full. It's basically a shuttle of deadheading UAL crew between the hubs.
 
No doubt, hub to hub commutes are always brutal.

The new base is what I'm trying to hammer out. I bid 40% in Newark, 7% in Kansas City and 15% in Dulles. I know Newark well, and Kansas City has flights, but Dulles has more. The question being, is the commute such a nightmare that it's not worth doing.

As an example, I was happy to stop doing the DTW-ORD commute because even though there were 20 flights a day, there were too many commuters and the commute was brutal.
 
I think Dulles will have decent commutability. It seems like most of the flights spend the night at outstations. The hardest part for me commuting out of Dulles is that you constantly have to make sure the gate agents don't forget about you. I've ended up in the jumpseat on many occasions while the gate agent clears an entire standby list even though I was number one on the list. I don't mind taking the jump and helping people out but it's nice when the agent asks first if I mind.
 
Go away. We don't want you here.

As for the -200, the weight restriction comes from one of two places.

1) It's nose heavy, so sometimes if its close, you have to add a bunch of ballast that puts you over your max landing weight.

2) Its a max landing weight issue. Most of the time it's fine. You'll run into problems on short legs and/or when you have an alternate. With the short legs, the burn off in cruise becomes too low a percentage of the fuel you need (taxi/takeoff/reserve) that trying to add more weight will put you over. Also our reserve is planned based on our cruise alt, so the lower the altitude, the more reserve fuel you'll need.

I think DTW is far enough you should be ok most of the time. Pull some of our releases for that flight on the company site. They have max bags/pax listed on the first page.
 
Are there any Dulles commuters here? How much of a knife fight is the jumpseat going into and out of Dulles?

Also, for the CRJ-200 drivers; what normally causes you to be weight restricted and thus, unable to take a jumpseater?

amorris311, jynxyjoe
I did a couple high speeds / standups there and never had anyone in the Jumpseat going to or from DTW. Obviously a short flight and lots of them. If you have a good captain he should be able to get you on and tell ops he won't leave without ballast.
 
Are there any Dulles commuters here? How much of a knife fight is the jumpseat going into and out of Dulles?

Also, for the CRJ-200 drivers; what normally causes you to be weight restricted and thus, unable to take a jumpseater?

amorris311, jynxyjoe


A friend of mine actually commutes IAD-DTW.

He absolutely hates it. IAD isn't like DTW to ALB/ROC/MDT/GSO type places where as long as it's not weight critical you're good to go. It always inevitably goes into a groundstop with the summer weather and it's really, really hot on the plane (he showed me a phone pic of the cabin at 35C last week, fortunately he was in the jumpseat and it was cooler up there). Simply awful reliability from the sound of it. The split terminal thing at DTW wouldn't help quell the BS either.
 
Are there any Dulles commuters here? How much of a knife fight is the jumpseat going into and out of Dulles?

Also, for the CRJ-200 drivers; what normally causes you to be weight restricted and thus, unable to take a jumpseater?

amorris311, jynxyjoe

I'll be doing it in a couple days, I'll look closely at the release. It's a -200 so I imagine landing weight restricted every time there is an alternate. I'll ask the gate agent too.

Commuting is for suckers!
 
I'll be doing it in a couple days, I'll look closely at the release. It's a -200 so I imagine landing weight restricted every time there is an alternate. I'll ask the gate agent too.

Commuting is for suckers!


Funny about that, because I could drive to Cleveland if I wanted. It's only 2.5 hours from my door to the employee parking lot, but the lines are so horrible, and I'm junior enough there that it doesn't make a whole lot of sense. I guess I could bid long call and try to sit at home as much as possible, but our long call guys are the first ones used, and they commonly end up with things like airport reserve.

As much as I'd love to live in base (even though I already do, what with living 20 minutes away from a CRJ base), I'm not willing to move to one of our bases when we've got a habit of opening and closing new bases in under 18 months.
 
Funny about that, because I could drive to Cleveland if I wanted. It's only 2.5 hours from my door to the employee parking lot, but the lines are so horrible, and I'm junior enough there that it doesn't make a whole lot of sense. I guess I could bid long call and try to sit at home as much as possible, but our long call guys are the first ones used, and they commonly end up with things like airport reserve.

As much as I'd love to live in base (even though I already do, what with living 20 minutes away from a CRJ base), I'm not willing to move to one of our bases when we've got a habit of opening and closing new bases in under 18 months.

Don't get me wrong, I'm a sucker too. Bailed from MEM for CHS. Wife and I figured that we'll just pick someplace we really want to live and figure out the commute later.
 
jtrain609 said:
Are there any Dulles commuters here? How much of a knife fight is the jumpseat going into and out of Dulles?

Also, for the CRJ-200 drivers; what normally causes you to be weight restricted and thus, unable to take a jumpseater?

amorris311, jynxyjoe

A full airplane an alternate fuel and too much cargo.

-200 problems that the 7/900 doesn't have.
 
Don't do it! Different company, but same commutes here. Currently driving to reserve in CLE and absolutely loving it. I can't even begin to describe the feeling of going to the employee lot and driving home not matter when you get in...

I've done the DTW-EWR commute, and, as I'm sure you know it's not bad. It has both the frequency and the equipment, but more importantly it has those early morning and late evening flights. I've looked at IAD for the same reason (I could hold a line there), but it doesn't have the early morning and late evening flights.

Some quick research on passrider shows the last (IAD-DTW) UA flight being at 1730ish, and the last DL flight at 1930ish.

Wait throw that all out. I just looked at DTW-EWR (haven't since the last time I commuted about 7 months ago) UA dropped back to ERJs! The horror! What happened to all the E-170s? Who screwed this up?! Was it you?!?

...

:cry:
 
Don't do it! Different company, but same commutes here. Currently driving to reserve in CLE and absolutely loving it. I can't even begin to describe the feeling of going to the employee lot and driving home not matter when you get in...

I've done the DTW-EWR commute, and, as I'm sure you know it's not bad. It has both the frequency and the equipment, but more importantly it has those early morning and late evening flights. I've looked at IAD for the same reason (I could hold a line there), but it doesn't have the early morning and late evening flights.

Some quick research on passrider shows the last (IAD-DTW) UA flight being at 1730ish, and the last DL flight at 1930ish.

Wait throw that all out. I just looked at DTW-EWR (haven't since the last time I commuted about 7 months ago) UA dropped back to ERJs! The horror! What happened to all the E-170s? Who screwed this up?! Was it you?!?

...

:cry:

I prefer the ERJ, I never get left behind :)
 
I prefer the ERJ, I never get left behind :)
Ah, yes. Well when it's your own metal... See I have to worry about getting bumped by spiky haired XJT types from Ann Arbor... ;)

Plus have you met those Shuttle FAs? I don't know who their recruiter is, but he does an excellent job! :D
 
Ah, yes. Well when it's your own metal... See I have to worry about getting bumped by spiky haired XJT types from Ann Arbor... ;)

Plus have you met those Shuttle FAs? I don't know who their recruiter is, but he does an excellent job! :D

You won't have to worry for long. I changed my bid to head west the other day.
 
You won't have to worry for long. I changed my bid to head west the other day.

im trying to go to cle. I will have a crap line but i can drive home from it afterwards. I dont know how you did this DTW-EWR commute for so long. its wearing me thin. and don't have a trip end on Saturday you will be stuck in EWR.
 
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