Too late to blame air changes on the pandemic

[FlyerTalker]

On 7/2/2022 at 4:16 PM, Dolebludger said:

I don’t know how the industry works, and I don’t want to know. Because what I know is that is isn’t working the way it is being run now.

 

And yet we get:

 

22 minutes ago, Dolebludger said:

The whole problem originated in the early 1980s when airlines were allowed to abandon direct flights in favor of connections — so that one delayed or canceled flight could ruin an entire trip.

 

Which purports to tell us exactly what the issues stem from.  Failing to recognize how a hub and spoke system actually increases the flight opportunities for an airline, AND ITS PASSENGERS, on an exponential scale.

 

 

[PasadenaDave]

19 minutes ago, FlyerTalker said:

 

And yet we get:

 

 

Which purports to tell us exactly what the issues stem from.  Failing to recognize how a hub and spoke system actually increases the flight opportunities for an airline, AND ITS PASSENGERS, on an exponential scale.

 

 

Correct, the opportunities for travel have increased exponentially while the price to fly has dropped, often in real terms not just inflated terms over the decades.

 

 I flew round trip JFK to Athens in 1986 for $650 when my salary was less than $20,000 and the job today pays $75,000.  In 1988 I generally paid $400 round trip LAX to Boston, today more, but not much more.

 

Next week I fly Burbank to Sacramento round trip same day $59 each way, that might be cheaper than Greyhound 

[Dolebludger]

There seems to be  no increased opportunities from the spoke and hub system Only increased chances for missed flights! I once had a cruise booked, until the flight there required four connections, and we cancelled the whole thing. We live in rural CO, so we know we will have a connection in Denver, Dallas, or Phoenix. Don’t know much about Phoenix, but a traveler should be able to get pretty much everywhere from Denver and Dallas. Once before Covid we had a cruise related flight from Lima Peru, to Denver, leaving us with only one connection back home. That was fine and worked out well.

[Globaliser]

4 hours ago, Dolebludger said:

There seems to be  no increased opportunities from the spoke and hub system ... We live in rural CO, so we know we will have a connection in Denver, Dallas, or Phoenix.

 

There are your increased opportunities, right there. Without the hub and spoke system, you would simply have to drive to Denver to get a flight. (Or Dallas or Phoenix, if you had the stamina.)

 

4 hours ago, Dolebludger said:

I once had a cruise booked, until the flight there required four connections ...

 

That was your own fault for booking a journey with four connections (which is borderline insanity), or allowing someone else to book your journey without clearly specifying what you were and were not prepared to put up with.

[Zach1213]

9 hours ago, Dolebludger said:

There seems to be  no increased opportunities from the spoke and hub system Only increased chances for missed flights! 

 

I couldn't disagree more. As someone who lives in a fairly small market in the middle of the US (Kansas City) but travels globally almost every week, I am able to do that easily because of hub-and-spoke systems. I can get out of Kansas City to Dallas or Chicago (or several other hubs) and suddenly have access to the rest of the world. I can get to Doha, or Tokyo, or Hong Kong, or Melbourne with one change. I have the opportunity to choose morning, afternoon, or evening departures, and if I need to change my flight because work went longer than expected, there are a myriad of choices to get me back home. 

[CruiserBruce]

10 hours ago, Dolebludger said:

There seems to be  no increased opportunities from the spoke and hub system Only increased chances for missed flights! I once had a cruise booked, until the flight there required four connections, and we cancelled the whole thing. We live in rural CO, so we know we will have a connection in Denver, Dallas, or Phoenix. Don’t know much about Phoenix, but a traveler should be able to get pretty much everywhere from Denver and Dallas. Once before Covid we had a cruise related flight from Lima Peru, to Denver, leaving us with only one connection back home. That was fine and worked out well.

Curious, where do you think you should be able to fly non-stop from your small town in Colorado? London? Beijing? Ain't going to happen. 

 

The hub and spoke system works very well. Back in the early Spring, a weather problem in Florida put a big dent in Southwest's (the biggest non-wheel and spoke operator) schedule for about 3 days. Their statement? As over half of their planes flying every day touch Florida at least once, on some leg of their non-hub based flights (a plane hopping, for example, OAK-DEN-MCO-ATL-DFW-PHX, etc), it massively disrupted their operations, leaving planes out of position, and people stranded, all over the place. If Southwest were hub and spoke, far fewer planes would have affected.

 

By the way, for us to get to Lima for a cruise, we had to fly SFO-IAH-LIM.

 

Yes, people in small locations probably feel more negatively affected by hub and spoke. But over all, its a pretty beneficial system.

[Dolebludger]

No, No. nobody expect to fly from a small town and go everywhere without going to a large airport first. But flying from that large airport often requires more connections than in the past. 

[Globaliser]

5 minutes ago, Dolebludger said:

nobody expect to fly from a small town and go everywhere without going to a large airport first.

 

You have just described the hub-and-spoke system in a single sentence. You benefit from this: you have said so yourself.

[iancal]

I suspect that many airlines, in anticipation of disappearing covid restrictions, went ahead and implemented  (and subsequently sold seats) significantly increased  flight schedules before they had a clear understanding of their potential post covid staffing constraints.

 

Same for the airports and the various airport security agencies.

 

It has come back to haunt them.  Catch up will take some time.

 

The flip side of the coin....the rental car agencies did the exact opposite.

Edited July 5, 2022 by iancal

[Zach1213]

1 hour ago, Dolebludger said:

But flying from that large airport often requires more connections than in the past. 

 

I disagree. The advent of new and innovative aircraft types has actually opened up markets that would never be there otherwise. On the smaller end of the aircraft spectrum, CRJs and ERJs have allowed places like Dubuque, Marquette, South Bend, and Wenatchee to have service from major cities that connect them to the world. On the other end of the spectrum, innovative new aircraft like the B787 and A350, which are not huge but are extremely fuel efficient, have opened markets one would have never expected 15-20 years ago - Houston to Auckland, Rome to Perth, Seattle to Papeete, Xiamen to Los Angeles. The combination of these two things means you can fly, for example, from Wenatchee to Tahiti with one stop in Seattle. That's wild to me. 

[CruiserBruce]

2 hours ago, Dolebludger said:

No, No. nobody expect to fly from a small town and go everywhere without going to a large airport first. But flying from that large airport often requires more connections than in the past. 

I seriously doubt that is true, even if it seems so. The airlines align their systems for efficiencies, but, particularly pre-Covid, it was  very frequent for airlines to make quarterly announcements of new routes and increasing frequencies. Yes, there is some shrinkage at this point due to Covid effects, but, generally, airlines are constantly increasing routes and frequencies.

 

I agree with others here...you seem at times to be arguing both sides of the issue.

[FlyerTalker]

39 minutes ago, CruiserBruce said:

I agree with others here...you seem at times to be arguing both sides of the issue.

 

Probably a result of:

 

On 7/2/2022 at 4:16 PM, Dolebludger said:

I don’t know how the industry works, and I don’t want to know. Because what I know is that is isn’t working the way it is being run now.

 

 

 

[rkacruiser]

There is something to be said for the hub and spoke arrangement (as has been noted in prior posts), but, in the days of regulated airlines, there was something to be said in support of aspects of that system.  At least for my local airport.

 

DAY has been a hub of the hub and spoke system.  We are now a spoke of that system.  But, in the days of regulation, we had flights that were non-stop flights that required no connections:  i.e. LAX-DAY and DAY-with a stop at IND-LAX.  This was a TWA L-1011 flight.  

 

As an international airport with excellent facilities, DAY is underutilized.  

[PasadenaDave]

I understand what the poster in rural areas was talking about.  Historically rural areas were challenged with air service.  Agreed that some rural places are experiencing a boom with air service but others are losing out.

 

I had occasion to go to Elko Nevada a few times in 1990 and 1991.  This was before the big era of Indian Casinos and there was a charter that would fly people from casino less areas to Elko for 2-3 days and then fly home, the plane sat there while passengers enjoyed the town.  I flew there last June last minute during the pandemic and the flight was full. 

 

I read not long ago that the airline was planning to stop service and the local government stepped in to subsidize continued flights.  If I recall, the same article, i think it was the WSJ also mentioned airlines threatening to pull out of Cedar City Utah so residents would need to drive to Salt Lake or Vegas.

 

Living in rural areas has its challenges, one is flights.

[Dolebludger]

Let me clarify something.I live in Durango, CO which has a population of about 20K. But because the City doesn’t annex much, our metro population is about 50K. Still a small place. We have no real problems with our regional carriers taking us to Denver, Dallas, or Phoenix to catch flights to our destination. What happens after that is the problem. Before moving here, we lived in Okla. City with a metro area of about 1M. Direct flights from OKC have been been  gradually eliminated for a long time. Now, flying anywhere from OKC usually involves the same sort of connections with unreliable flights thereafter. When I lived in OKC I was a corporate litigation attorney. There used to be direct flights from OKC to Washington, D.C., and a bunch of other destinations. Not any more. So it matters not whether I live in Durango or OKC. Either way, I still have to fly to a hub, with further connections and unreliable flights to get to my destination. 
 

If you have ever been in the Durango airport, you’ll know that it isn’t a problem. Uncrowded, flights in and out usually on time or about so — sometimes early if you can believe that!  We have no problem flying out and in to it. My problem is what happens on the other parts of our trip. 

[FlyerTalker]

1 hour ago, Dolebludger said:

I was a corporate litigation attorney.

 

My problem is what happens on the other parts of our trip. 

 

Perhaps this is your answer:

 

www.netjets.com

 

Eliminate having to depend on those pesky airlines and their "unreliable flights".

[Zach1213]

11 hours ago, Dolebludger said:

There used to be direct flights from OKC to Washington, D.C., and a bunch of other destinations. Not any more.

 

American and Southwest fly nonstop OKC-DCA. 

Edited July 6, 2022 by Zach1213

[FlyerTalker]

29 minutes ago, Zach1213 said:

American and Southwest fly nonstop OKC-DCA. 

 

There you go again....introducing facts into a perfectly illogical ranting thread.

[Mary229]

All systems, regulations, logistics aside, no one ever said post Covid leisure travel was going to be flawless.  In some sectors and regions Covid is not over.   2022 travel is not for everyone.  

[Globaliser]

On 7/6/2022 at 3:19 AM, Dolebludger said:

There used to be direct flights from OKC to Washington, D.C., and a bunch of other destinations. Not any more. 

 

Taking today (7 July) as a random example, you can fly direct from OKC to the following destinations:

• Atlanta
• Austin
• Charlotte
• Chicago (2 airports)
• Corpus Christi+
• Dallas and Fort Worth
• Denver
• Destin and Fort Walton Beach
• Greenville and Spartanburg+
• Houston (2 airports)
• Las Vegas
• Los Angeles
• Miami
• Minneapolis and Saint Paul
• Nashville+
• New Orleans+
• New York City
• Orlando+
• Palm Springs+
• Philadelphia+
• Phoenix
• Salt Lake City
• San Antonio
• San Diego+
• Seattle
• St Louis
• Washington

+ - by a stopping direct flight

[Z'Loth]

5 hours ago, Globaliser said:

Taking today (7 July) as a random example, you can fly direct from OKC to the following destinations:

 

Here is a map.