why was the aircraft changed?

There used to be a morning flight out of SGF for delta that was an MD-88. On May 1st, this flight stopped. All flights out of SGF are now Delta Express. Does anyone have any information on why they no longer have this flight? It was flying under DL2099. I have looked up several of the tail numbers and these aircraft are still in service, so it appears they just canceled the flight itself. Below is a snippit via the flight number

01-May-2017 A319 Jackson Hole (KJAC) Salt Lake City Intl (KSLC) 06:51AM MDT 07:29AM MDT 0:37
30-Apr-2017 MD88 Springfield (KSGF) Hartsfield-Jackson Intl (KATL) 05:40AM CDT 08:14AM EDT 1:34

Individual aircraft fly all over the system so to see one aircraft on the same flight is actually pretty rare.
Delta may have decided that the MD 88 was better suited to a different route with more passengers, maybe future bookings were lagging so here comes the RJ.
Having made that decision, probably many months ago, it freed up flight number 2099 to be used elsewhere.
It is also a sneaky way for airlines to hide on time bad performance as required to be published by the FAA. Those reports are flight number AND route specific. So now 2099 starts a whole new set of on time performance numbers.

As to why they stopped using a Maddog, best guess would be a combo including pax loads not making economic sense for the MD as well as the impending retirement of the Maddogs. AFAIK United also uses their express carriers to serve SGF.

Likely, more changes coming, in the not too distant future, for the SGF-ATL route.

prnewswire.com/news-releases … 02213.html

“Early termination of Delta CPA (Capacity Purchase Agreement). Additionally, ExpressJet and Delta Air Lines mutually agreed to initiate the wind-down of its remaining dual-class flying agreement under the Delta Connection brand, allowing ExpressJet opportunities to place aircraft with other partners. The agreement, which includes 28 CRJ900s and 33 CRJ700s, was previously scheduled to expire beginning in 2019. The aircraft financed by Delta, including all CRJ900s, will be returned to Delta beginning in fourth quarter 2017; ExpressJet expects to transition other aircraft previously operated under its Delta agreement to other major partners throughout 2018.”