While the economics of operating 50-seat jets has put those aircraft at a disadvantage to larger 70 and 90-seat aircraft, the fundamentals of their emergence late in the last decade remain intact: namely US pilot scope clauses.

Scope caps the number of regional jets operated by carriers on behalf of their partners, and also limits the number of seats per aircraft. United, Delta, Northwest and US Airways all got some relief on the 50-seat cap during their respective stints in Chapter 11 during the early 2000s. But American and Continental are still largely constrained to operating 50-seat aircraft.

As Bombardier works to secure orders for its 100-seat CRJ1000 and CSeries aircraft and Embraer’s orderbook tilts towards the larger end of its 170/190 E-Jet family, it appears that aircraft with roughly 76-to 86-seats are becoming the new dividing point between regional and mainline aircraft. A few regional carriers operate aircraft in the 86-seat range, but most of the l

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