It looks like AMR will go into bankruptcy protection soon as will most of the traditional airlines. I think that we are at the end of an era when we thought that there was no impediment to travel. The traditional setup just cannot cope. It is based on the industrial model of efficiency. The new world will be based on an ecosystem of effectiveness.
It is therefore likely that we will endure a considerable interim period where not only the cost of travel will rise, the hassle of security will rise and there will be fewer flights. What are our alternatives? Video for business? I suspect that video will become huge. The train - I have started to take the overnight train from Moncton to Montreal and have to say that it is very nice. The train between Toronto and Montreal is very convenient - downtown stations, club car, internet access, meals. Really a better way. But for many of you in the US there is not much of a train alternative. Driving - the distances are too big in most cases. Bus? oooh no.
I hope that the big airlines are not rescued however. This will mean that we preserve a failed model for longer. For me the ah ha is that what is killing the airlines is that most of them have built their business on the industrial model of efficiency and that this is too rigid a model to survive a lot of change such as we live through.
It will be better to let the dinosaurs go and see a new type of air ecosystem emerge. What might it be like? I see the possibility of local air jitneys. If you go to Bangkok or even Kiev, you will not see a traditional bus system but a much more chaotic insect type of world where masses of small operators run 15 seater vans which you hail like a taxi. The system works very well for all. You get from a- b. It is cheap. There is always a van. The van operator make a good living. I can see this type of jitney of the air where I live on PEI. A shuttle running to Halifax and to Moncton where the trunk routes pick up. What does this mean for equipment? Paradoxically I see the market for smaller equipment being the key. The Southwest model suggests keeping with one model and not too big so you get good loads. The Jumbo model is based on the efficiency model which is the model which is dying.
The efficiency model is based on making a huge investment up front in the process and then trying to fill your process. This model is being destroyed in every field. Wal-Mart's inventory system, Dells' manufacturing system, Southwest's system even eBay are all responsive system that adjust to the world rather that try and predict it and create efficiencies. This is another reason I think that MCD will die too. Ray Kroc added the Ford production line to the Mom and Pop hamburger joint and made a great business out of this for 45 years. It is now too rigid to cope.
What times we live in!
7:47:25 AM 
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