I'll just link to two separate comments I made: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16098498 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16098498 https://news.ycomb

I'll just link to two separate comments I made: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16098498 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16098498 https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=16098341 https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=16098341 Southwest doesn't actually have a hub at every city they fly to. They just have a lot of hubs. They do this by a regional strategy: Nearly every flight goes from a spoke to a hub or focus city (the distinction between the two is irrelevant to the passenger, but relevant to the airline), to another hub or focus city, then ends at a spoke. It's a strategy that has worked out well for them, as it gives them a huge direct flight network despite running what is essentially still a hub and spoke network, because focus cities don't have to have maintenance operations. It's a cool strategy, but only really works regionally because shorter flights mean that they can run multi-leg routes that stop at a full hub at some point. Because it only works regionally, it is completely irrelevant to the discussion in the widebody market.