According to ABC News, some American families are opting to fly this summer rather than drive, because the airlines will get them to their destination cheaper than they could drive themselves:

It’s an American summer tradition: Pack the suitcases, put the kids in the car, and hit the open road. But not this summer, say the Itkinses of Falls Church, Va. To save money, they are flying to Disney World instead of driving. The Itkin family’s travel package, including three round-trip tickets and a two-night hotel stay, cost them $1,065. The American Automobile Association (AAA) estimated the same trip by car would have cost them $1,334 — almost $300 more.

Is this really true? The $1065 number is seemingly just 3 tickets and 2 hotel nights, not food, park tickets, etc. I’ll venture a guess here: $150 per night for the hotel, which leaves 3 tickets at $255 each. Seems possible. (Heck, you could do it for less, but these prices are plausible.)

So what about the driving itinerary?

Given what we know about the Itkin family, their drive will be 868 miles, about 13.5 hours each way. Add some miles for driving around the Orlando area, and round up a bit, and you’ve got about 2000 miles. Given the distance and time, I assume that they’re building an overnight into both outbound and inbound, since it’s a long trip, plus the two nights in Orlando. Let’s use $150 for the hotel — it isn’t cheap for a hotel, especially a roadside motel, but it’s in the ballpark and makes a harder case, so let’s use that number anyway. So $600 in lodging expenses.

To get to the AAA’s estimate, the Itkin family would still need to spend $734 in gasoline. At $3 per gallon, that’s 244 gallons of gas. In 2000 miles? That’s 8mpg! What are they driving? Heck, even a Hummer H3 now gets 20mpg highway… Unless they’re adding in the time value of money, the AAA estimates don’t make sense to me.

Any help out there?

(Update: Niel in comments sets me straight, reminding me of the federal reimbursement rate for vehicle use… That adds up quickly. Whether or not it’s an accurate reflection of costs is another matter. Thanks, Niel!

Also this article in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram on the same issue of flying vs. driving. The “comparative advantage” of driving increases the more people you’re toting around.)

A few small Friday afternoon items (RJ-sized, perhaps?):

- Spirit Airlines $8 each way (pretax) fire sale fare sale ends tonight. Dates and availablity are obviously limited, but it’s darn cheap. The booby prize, if the $8 fare is sold out, is a $44 fare. (via smartertravel.com)

- A DeLand, Florida teacher was suspended for offering his students extra credit for collecting AirTran coupons from Wendy’s beverage cups. (32 cups equaled a free ticket under the promotion.) On the plus side, very few Wendy’s cups were littering America’s streets, and one school’s kids got a valuable less in frequent flyer miles… (via Today in the Sky)

- What better way to spend $37,200 than on a SINGLE NIGHT at Cannes’ Hotel Martinez penthouse suite, the most expensive hotel room in the world?

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Taking a page from Ryanair’s playbook, Air Canada effectively began charging bottom-fare customers for checked luggage on Wednesday.

Starting today [April 26], Air Canada customers booking a Tango fare at aircanada.com, will be eligible for up to $20 savings on their return trip if they agree not to make any changes to their booked itinerary, and agree to fly without checked baggage, within the normal carry-on bag allowance only. To obtain the discount, customers simply click on the GO Discount Tango fare option when making their online booking.

Air Canada already sells tickets in a simplified set of five fare types. Of these, “Tango’ is the cheapest, and they already sock it to you for things like seat assignments ($15) and limited mileage earnings (both redeemable and elite-qualifying).

I was amused to see an enthusiastic press release from the “Coalition for Luggage Security,” seemingly a front for a penny-stock company that offers to ship your luggage to your destination in advance of your travels. Their statement, dripping with praise of Air Canada’s new consumer-unfriendly policy, is a howler:

Other airlines should take their lead. We believe more airlines will adopt similar pricing and option models when they realize the savings to consumers and their own business. Soon we may see offering the shipping of luggage during reservations, and charging for carry-ons, or separate lines into airports for those travelers without luggage. The ideas are only limited by the willingness for airlines to become profitable, governments to release their controls on the traveling public, airports to utilize more effective use of space and infrastructure and most importantly for the American people to re-embrace freedom of movement without restrictions.

Look, I am all for carry-ons rather than checked luggage, but checking in bags doesn’t mean you aren’t embracing freedom of movement. What’s next? If you don’t use online check-in, the terrorists have won!? Oy.

But back to Air Canada: They can save the last dance for someone else. I won’t Tango.

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Priceline’s latest US-based promotion/sweepstakes may be of interest to the Upgrade: Travel Better crowd. The “Ultimate Upgrade” offers free private jet travel, or, more likely, upgrades on American or USAirways. (The catch: If you win an upgrade, you have to buy the ticket you wish to upgrade from Priceline; presumably the name-your-own-price tickets are not eligible.)

Entry is automatic for air or air+hotel purchases. “No purchase necessary” — mail in a card. See here for the full rules.

The private jet services are offered through OneSky, which is notable for offering discounted private jet travel for repositioning flights. Let’s say someone books a plane to fly from New York to Miami, and someone else books the same plane to fly from Washington to Chicago. The aircraft has to get from Miami to Washington, but it has no one to carry. Enter OneSky, which purports to offer access to such flights at a discount to normal private jet rates. Still not cheap, to be sure, but cheaper than retail.

Looks like Germans are following in the great American tradition of suing everyone.

According to an article in Aertzezeitung, a German medical daily (!?), an unnamed airline (cough, Lufthansa, cough…) was found liable for confusing its passengers by codesharing.

The plaintiff’s ticket was issued by one airline, with its own flight number, but operated by another under a codeshare agreement. The passenger lined up to check in with the airline who ISSUED the ticket, not the airline actually operating the flight. He missed his flight and sued. The airline’s argument was simple: He should have read the ticket and checked the airport monitors. But the Oberlandesgericht (~state supreme court) in Frankfurt found in favor of the plaintiff and awarded him 10,000 euros.

Some codeshares can indeed be confusing, but come on… Suing?? Knowing where you’re going is a minimum basic skill for travel.

Codeshares indeed have their pluses and minuses. On the one hand, you open up a range of additional flight options, with mileage-earning opportunities. Perhaps most attractively, the price for the same flight may vary, depending on which airline is selling it. Same schedule — same plane! — but different price.

But there are real downsides, too, though. You don’t always earn miles on a codeshare as you would on the issuing airline’s operated flight, even if the airlines are in the same alliance; rather, you earn according to the rules accorded to the partner airline. (I believe American Airlines is an exception: If you buy a codeshare with an AA number, you get miles as if it’s AA.) Upgrades may be a problem. Changing a ticket may involve an additional layer of bureaucracy.

Seat assignments can be a pain in the butt, too. A family member recently reserved a flight operated by Lufthansa, but sold with a United flight number. Her seat assignments were missing by the time she checked in with Lufthansa. The check-in agent scoffed, “Oh, it’s a United-issued seat assignment? No wonder.” Nice to see the Star Alliance working so seamlessly. (The lesson: call the operating airline for seat assignments.)

She got a seat, but not the one she reserved weeks earlier. Maybe she should have sued for compensation.

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CNN/Money reports that Airbus denies yesterday’s NYT report that they were pitching standing-room-only “seating” to Asian airlines. (I admit I still enjoy the phrase “Hannibal class” to describe these seats…) The Airbus spokesperson even calls the report “crap.” But this was a front-page article, and author Christopher Elliott is holding firm, according to IAG.:

Current information from the NYT reporter (Chris Elliott) is as follows: “An Airbus spokeswoman admitted to me last night that the standing room seat exists. Its only argument with the story is that it said it no longer is pitching the concept. But the seats are real.”

Sounds like Airbus is backpedaling. Nonetheless, for those fearing the advent of Hannibal class, breathe easily, this is good news…

(image: adapted from NYT)