It depends on the route, some big routes are allowed 3 airlines (like NYC-MEX). The intent of the bilateral was basically Mexico wanting to make sure their carriers had a chance and routes would not be flooded by capacity from US carriers. Mexican carriers are now in a place where they WANT to compete with more US carriers and are in a much healthier position to do so.
So, it was recently agreed that the USA/Mexico bilateral will be liberalized. It will be as close as open skies as you can get without actual open skies. Carriers will still have to apply for routes, but there will be no hard cap on number of airlines on each route.
And yes, SNA has had immigration and customs on site and has had it for several years.
I thought the original topic of the thread was pretty irrelevant.
Basically, Delta has a new strategy when it comes to aircraft purchases - they feel that future advancements in aircraft technology will be minimal and therefore they won’t order aircraft until they are established and known quantities and prices have declined. Delta is in a good spot right now with their fleet where they have enough current technology aircraft to maintain their core network and if the economy turns or fuel skyrockets, they can just park 757’s and MD-88’s as they see fit. This will give them flexibility that AA and United, whose fleets will consist of almost entirely new aircraft will not have.
The downside of this is that they will get nothing for these aircraft when they do retire them and will be at somewhat of a cost disadvantage to AA and UA, especially if fuel costs increase.
UA actually made off pretty well on the sale of their 757’s and 737 classics.
