3 ms·

Surely in a hub and spoke model the hubs should be in places in the middle of nowhere that nobody actually wants to go to. Why does it makes sense to have the h

Surely in a hub and spoke model the hubs should be in places in the middle of nowhere that nobody actually wants to go to. Why does it makes sense to have the hubs in London, Paris or New York? They should be significantly far away from the city that they can grow easily (not really possible in the UK, though).

candiodari 9y ago
I thought so too at one point. However, airports need tens of thousands of employees, so middle of nowhere, nope. Doesn't work. Everything from "drag this box here" employees, waiters/waitresses to highly specialized engineers to accountants. Also, it is a big advantage for hubs to have a steady flow of traffic to the hub. Thirdly, most carriers don't just get a hub from the government, the government cheats further. So in practice most carriers have tax advantages in their hub, as well as preferential treatment. Although getting governments to approve middle of nowhere airports also doesn't seem to work too well. Why ? No idea. Perhaps issue is that they too would need to get personnel into the middle of nowhere. But the current situation means a number of things. One, aircraft carriers will buy lots of little planes and won't do well. Second, they won't be matching Emirates or Etihad on pricing or customer conditions any time soon. Emirates and Etihad and a few others will do well.
bluGill 9y ago
No, hubs need to be big cities. The cheapest flight is direct a to b when the flight is large and full. When one of A or B is a large city that means there are more people who want to take the flight. New York will have direct flights to everywhere in North America even without being a hub because it is large enough live there that direct flights make sense. Then it becomes a hub by accident as people who want to get from small city to small city without a direct flight discover they can make New York a hub and get there. They would prefer a direct flight, but not enough people live in either to make it worthwhile.
7952 9y ago
Surely Dubai works like this.

candiodari 9y ago

I thought so too at one point. However, airports need tens of thousands of employees, so middle of nowhere, nope. Doesn't work. Everything from "drag this box here" employees, waiters/waitresses to highly specialized engineers to accountants. Also, it is a big advantage for hubs to have a steady flow of traffic to the hub. Thirdly, most carriers don't just get a hub from the government, the government cheats further. So in practice most carriers have tax advantages in their hub, as well as preferential treatment. Although getting governments to approve middle of nowhere airports also doesn't seem to work too well. Why ? No idea. Perhaps issue is that they too would need to get personnel into the middle of nowhere. But the current situation means a number of things. One, aircraft carriers will buy lots of little planes and won't do well. Second, they won't be matching Emirates or Etihad on pricing or customer conditions any time soon. Emirates and Etihad and a few others will do well.

bluGill 9y ago

No, hubs need to be big cities. The cheapest flight is direct a to b when the flight is large and full. When one of A or B is a large city that means there are more people who want to take the flight. New York will have direct flights to everywhere in North America even without being a hub because it is large enough live there that direct flights make sense. Then it becomes a hub by accident as people who want to get from small city to small city without a direct flight discover they can make New York a hub and get there. They would prefer a direct flight, but not enough people live in either to make it worthwhile.

7952 9y ago

Surely Dubai works like this.