American Airlines Cutting 27 Routes
News came out this week that has American Airlines cutting 27 routes. The cuts hitting New York City the hardest with 18 routes being eliminated from the area airports. It appears American is going back on its promise to expand in the New York area with these changes. Some of this may be because of the newer JetBlue partnership and coverage they offer as well. The other cuts are focused mostly on the Northeast corridor, as well as, flights to parts of Canada.
Here is a list of all 27 cuts, as well as the dates service ends (HT TPG)
| Origin | Destination | Effective Date |
| Boston (BOS) | Raleigh-Durham (RDU) | Jan. 4, 2022 |
| Charlotte (CLT) | Champaign/Urbana, Illinois (CMI) | April 5, 2022 |
| CLT | Toledo, Ohio (TOL) | April 5, 2022 |
| New York-JFK | Liberia, Costa Rica (LIR) | April 5, 2022 |
| JFK | San Antonio (SAT) | Jan. 4, 2022 |
| JFK | San Jose, Costa Rica (SJO) | April 5, 2022 |
| JFK | Montreal (YUL) | Jan. 4, 2022 |
| JFK | Toronto (YYZ) | Jan. 4, 2022 |
| New York/LaGuardia (LGA) | Nantucket, Massachusetts (ACK) | June 17, 2022 |
| LGA | Asheville, North Carolina (AVL) | March 27, 2022 |
| LGA | Bangor, Maine (BGR) | Jan. 4, 2022 |
| LGA | Boston (BOS) | Jan. 4, 2022 |
| LGA | Charleston, South Carolina (CHS) | Jan. 4, 2022 |
| LGA | Orlando (MCO) | Jan. 4, 2022 |
| LGA | Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts (MVY) | June 17, 2022 |
| LGA | Myrtle Beach, South Carolina (MYR) | June 2, 2022 |
| LGA | Philadelphia (PHL) | Jan. 4, 2022 |
| LGA | Pensacola (PNS) | May 5, 2022 |
| LGA | Portland, Maine (PWM) | Jan. 4, 2022 |
| LGA | Savannah, Georgia (SAV) | June 3, 2022 |
| LGA | Traverse City, Michigan (TVC) | June 2, 2022 |
| Chicago (ORD) | Charlottesville, Virginia (CHO) | April 5, 2022 |
| Philadelphia (PHL) | Baltimore (BWI) | April 5, 2022 |
| PHL | Charleston, West Virginia (CRW) | April 5, 2022 |
| PHL | Ottawa (YOW) | April 5, 2022 |
| Phoenix (PHX) | Vancouver (YVR) | April 5, 2022 |
| PHX | Calgary (YYC) | April 5, 2022 |
Final Thoughts
I am not surprised to see American Airlines cutting 27 routes, changes are always happening. But, I am surprised that so much of it is focused on New York based airports JFK and LGA. Some of the routes like LGA to Traverse City (small town in Michigan) are understandable, I doubt that demand is high. The cuts to Orlando, Pensacola, Savannah etc. are a bit surprising though. They did not give a reason for the cuts but these are almost always because of poor performance of the route. These changes also pull American Airlines out of Ottawa as well.
Which route cut surprises you the most? Let me know in the comments.
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Most of these make good sense except cutting Martha’s Vineyard, Nantucket etc during peak summer travel season. Why not kill those routes after Xmas?
Some of the timing seemed strange for sure
I don’t understand AA pulling out completely of Ottawa. It’s a market of 1.5 million that is now almost entirely dominated by *A with just feeder routes to YYZ, YYC, EWR and IAD.
I think Delta pulled out of the area too, which is surprising. I would get it when everything was closed down but with travel finally opening up between US and Canada it does seem like weird timing.
Bummer about the YOW cuts—Ottawa is the gateway to a lot of northern Canada and it was nice to have a good connection from PHL
Yeah, I was surprised by that
Bummer about Pensacola. I’ll have to drive to New Orleans now to get a direct flight to NY.
🙁
If AA can cut another 50 routes before Thanksgiving, maybe they will have enough reserves/staff to avoid more epic meltdowns over the holidays.
Haha…doubtful. It is AA, they would find a way!
almost all of the cut NYC routes are served by Jetblue, with the exception of canada. No shocker there.
True, shows they are all in with the partnership.