airwiz
June 10, 2001, 05:26 AM
I was curious when Norman Mineta, SecTrans, came out with his "reading the tea leaves" remark about the UA/USair merger last week. This guy wouldn't go public with such a remark without being unequivocally sure of himself. Then, there was nothing at all from the Justice Dept. refuting Mineta's remarks.
I called a friend of mine who was a Legislative Assistant in Mineta's San Jose Congressional Office, now working for DOT (surprise!) She told me that the merger in its "cutrrent iteration" is dead on arrival..period. She also let loose of a very intersting tidbit. Last year the Congressional Travel Office, responsible for booking 80% of Congress' itineraries, sent around a survey form with a number of questions one of which was: List your carrier preference for all travel. also please indicate your least favorite carrier. As a second part of the question, it asked the respondents if they wanted to be notifed prior to booking flights on that carrier.
Guess who came up as the LEAST FAVORITE CARRIER CHOSEN BY 70% OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS?
YEP! Also, I'm told that most of the respondents wanted to be told that UA was the only alternative in a given segment. With this kind of reputation, how could UA management ever seriously believe this merger would happen? Did Elk Grove know of this animosity prior to announcing the merger? By the way, the overwheling favorite carrier in this survey was AA followed by CO and DL came in third.
I called a friend of mine who was a Legislative Assistant in Mineta's San Jose Congressional Office, now working for DOT (surprise!) She told me that the merger in its "cutrrent iteration" is dead on arrival..period. She also let loose of a very intersting tidbit. Last year the Congressional Travel Office, responsible for booking 80% of Congress' itineraries, sent around a survey form with a number of questions one of which was: List your carrier preference for all travel. also please indicate your least favorite carrier. As a second part of the question, it asked the respondents if they wanted to be notifed prior to booking flights on that carrier.
Guess who came up as the LEAST FAVORITE CARRIER CHOSEN BY 70% OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS?
YEP! Also, I'm told that most of the respondents wanted to be told that UA was the only alternative in a given segment. With this kind of reputation, how could UA management ever seriously believe this merger would happen? Did Elk Grove know of this animosity prior to announcing the merger? By the way, the overwheling favorite carrier in this survey was AA followed by CO and DL came in third.