4 ms·

Let's say a gate handles 2 flights an hour and operates for 18 hours a day (last flight 11pm, first flight 5am). That's a gate capacity of 36 flights per day.

Let's say a gate handles 2 flights an hour and operates for 18 hours a day (last flight 11pm, first flight 5am). That's a gate capacity of 36 flights per day. Saving 2 mins per flight frees up an hour of gate time daily. That's enough to squeeze in two more flights into that gate. If United is operating 10 gates at an airport, that's room for 20 more flights a day. Now I don't know whether gate capacity is the main bottleneck but I do know "waiting for a gate" is a common problem after landing, so it must be an issue to some degree.

ttymck 3y ago
_up to_ 2 minutes. No mention of the actual distribution, so I'm willing to bet it will most often be 0 improvement, or an actual net negative, when you get a confused family or otherwise indignant group wondering why they can't board together.
SoftTalker 3y ago
In theory yes but in reality one passenger fumbling around looking for a spot for their carryon bags can easily add 2 minutes to the boarding process. And the very early and very late flights are probably not full so there won't be much savings there. Each economy passenger should get one carryon that must be able to fit under the seat. If you want legroom, you can put it in the overhead bin. Nobody needs more than that for personal items that may be needed during the flight. Extra carryons could possibly be allowed for a fee, if it's high enough that we don't end up back with the problem we currently have.
- xyzelement 3y ago
  // in reality one passenger fumbling around looking for a spot for their carryon bags can easily add 2 minutes Yes but in the new model this delay is on top of an improved baseline so you are still 2 minutes ahead on average. A good indicator that this matters is that United, who presumably knows their business better than you and I, is excited enough about it to implement the change. // Nobody needs more than that for personal items that may be needed during the flight. The goal of carry on isn’t for me to access personal items. It’s to enable me to get out of the airport and be in the taxi, half way to my meeting, while you wait for the carousel.
  - ttymck 3y ago
    > good indicator that this matters is that United My experience suggests coprorate decision making is never as data driven as it seems. I'm willing to bet there's some VP at United who is banking on the hype for this to carry them into the next echelon.
- jrockway 3y ago
  I think the original intent for carry-on + personal item is that a carry-on is a backpack and the personal item is your purse (so only 50% of the population has one). They stopped measuring carry-ons and now people take an ordinary suitcase as their carry-on and their maximum-allowed-carry-on-sized-bag as their personal item. Neither fit under the seat. (I personally have been using a maximum-allowed-size backpack forever, and because it's soft, it can easily be crushed under the seat in front of me. It's not pleasant! But I've done it. Everyone should be like me.)
  - SoftTalker 3y ago
    > They stopped measuring carry-ons Why? I don't fly very much, and I remember those frames that your carry-on bag had to fit in or you'd have to check it. Why did this stop?
    - brigade 3y ago
      Waste of time and being combative with passengers with wildly inconsistent enforcement of bags that touch the edges, or were compliant sizes until the airline changed its rules, or are currently compliant with other airlines' allowed sizes, and fit in the overhead anyway in the correct orientation because mainline airplanes have basically two actual bin sizes (and bins in regional planes generally can't fit the allowed carryon dimensions anyway.) Really, the only stupidly large carryons I see people trying their luck is the occasional 60l+ hiking backpack, which are obvious enough that gate agents could force them to measure.

ttymck 3y ago

_up to_ 2 minutes. No mention of the actual distribution, so I'm willing to bet it will most often be 0 improvement, or an actual net negative, when you get a confused family or otherwise indignant group wondering why they can't board together.

SoftTalker 3y ago

In theory yes but in reality one passenger fumbling around looking for a spot for their carryon bags can easily add 2 minutes to the boarding process. And the very early and very late flights are probably not full so there won't be much savings there. Each economy passenger should get one carryon that must be able to fit under the seat. If you want legroom, you can put it in the overhead bin. Nobody needs more than that for personal items that may be needed during the flight. Extra carryons could possibly be allowed for a fee, if it's high enough that we don't end up back with the problem we currently have.

xyzelement 3y ago
// in reality one passenger fumbling around looking for a spot for their carryon bags can easily add 2 minutes Yes but in the new model this delay is on top of an improved baseline so you are still 2 minutes ahead on average. A good indicator that this matters is that United, who presumably knows their business better than you and I, is excited enough about it to implement the change. // Nobody needs more than that for personal items that may be needed during the flight. The goal of carry on isn’t for me to access personal items. It’s to enable me to get out of the airport and be in the taxi, half way to my meeting, while you wait for the carousel.
- ttymck 3y ago
  > good indicator that this matters is that United My experience suggests coprorate decision making is never as data driven as it seems. I'm willing to bet there's some VP at United who is banking on the hype for this to carry them into the next echelon.
jrockway 3y ago
I think the original intent for carry-on + personal item is that a carry-on is a backpack and the personal item is your purse (so only 50% of the population has one). They stopped measuring carry-ons and now people take an ordinary suitcase as their carry-on and their maximum-allowed-carry-on-sized-bag as their personal item. Neither fit under the seat. (I personally have been using a maximum-allowed-size backpack forever, and because it's soft, it can easily be crushed under the seat in front of me. It's not pleasant! But I've done it. Everyone should be like me.)
- SoftTalker 3y ago
  > They stopped measuring carry-ons Why? I don't fly very much, and I remember those frames that your carry-on bag had to fit in or you'd have to check it. Why did this stop?
  - brigade 3y ago
    Waste of time and being combative with passengers with wildly inconsistent enforcement of bags that touch the edges, or were compliant sizes until the airline changed its rules, or are currently compliant with other airlines' allowed sizes, and fit in the overhead anyway in the correct orientation because mainline airplanes have basically two actual bin sizes (and bins in regional planes generally can't fit the allowed carryon dimensions anyway.) Really, the only stupidly large carryons I see people trying their luck is the occasional 60l+ hiking backpack, which are obvious enough that gate agents could force them to measure.