And so it begins, the culling of destinations served by AirTran Airways as it gets merged into Southwest Airlines. Recall that Southwest currently serves 72 destinations. AirTran also serves 32 of these plus another three dozen places or so — including Charlotte — that Southwest doesn’t currently fly to. So the question since the merger was announced is which of these AirTran-unique cities will become part of the Southwest network and which will get dropped.
AirTran/Southwest announced the first cuts today: Asheville, Atlantic City, NJ, Moline, IL, and Newport News, VA.
Charlotte is widely expected to be kept and gain Southwest service. That isn’t official yet though and may not come in any case for another year or more.
