KCRag Forum

I really enjoyed MidWest Express for the few years they operated KCI as a 2nd hub outside of Milwaukee. I sued it for business and personal travel. Loved the first class, 2 seat setup throughout the entire cabin. I'm 6''5" so anything that improves space is welcomed. Would love to see an airline actually be able to function like that again, appeal to business and leisure travelers, even if there was a slight premium to ticket costs. If I recall they were not outrageous. Less than traditional 1st class tickets and a bit more than Southwest.

JetBlue will launch service to Boston and JFK next year.

swid wrote: ↑Wed Apr 21, 2021 10:59 am JetBlue will launch service to Boston and JFK next year.

1 stop Jet Blue service to Europe?

Great news for KC and KCI!

normalthings wrote: ↑Wed Apr 21, 2021 11:04 am 1 stop Jet Blue service to Europe?

Only if it's a morning schedule so you can make the connection.

beautyfromashes wrote: ↑Wed Apr 21, 2021 1:36 pm

normalthings wrote: ↑Wed Apr 21, 2021 11:04 am 1 stop Jet Blue service to Europe?

Only if it's a morning schedule so you can make the connection.

The JetBlue announcement is in co-ordination with American Air. AA announced new us routes and these new international ones

https://news.aa.com/news/news-details/2 ... ault.aspx

normalthings wrote: ↑Wed Apr 21, 2021 2:35 pm The JetBlue announcement is in co-ordination with American Air. AA announced new us routes and these new international ones

https://news.aa.com/news/news-details/2 ... ault.aspx

Yes, but you have to have decent connections. Air Canada flies out of KCI to Toronto, but it arrives just after all the Europe flights have left. You have to layover over night. New connections to Boston (unless that is your destination) is pointless if you have a 6 hour layover or more. It won’t be viable for international.

If we eventually got an lax flight that would set up a pretty nice east/west corridor. Can't be an accident that they fly London out of jfk and Boston (or will)

Doesn't look like it'll be much use to me but yay for more competition.

earthling wrote: ↑Tue Mar 30, 2021 10:13 am Vangard couldn't survive the 9/11 impact, was doing well before that. The Feds bailed out many airlines but Vangard wasn't included in bailout funds (IIRC). It may have continued on fine and perhaps have grown if it weren't for 9/11. The new terminal will also be more hub friendly, so better conditions than old airport.

For the record, they did get several million of the bailout money, but it wasn't enough to save them. At the end of the day, the cost, complexity, and 9/11 adjacent timing of them switching to the SABRE reservation system screwed them hard I think.

Ah, I see on their Wiki page it was $2M-$3M aid and SABRE transition issues, not able to survive the two. However with a new terminal more conducive to hub activity perhaps another KC-based Vangard-like startup can have better chance as market conditions improve, and KC region is now larger. With the major airlines focusing on core hubs, many mid-sized cities like KC might need their own local-based airline to fill in gaps or provide better competition. Vangard was doing a great job filling gaps and providing competition before 9/11 hit. And that was with an airport not well designed for a hub and smaller market. KCI had over 100 non-stop destinations then, now it's under 50.

Would love to to see us become a mini-hub with E jet and A220 service across the midwest.

normalthings wrote: ↑Wed Apr 21, 2021 6:20 pm Would love to to see us become a mini-hub with E jet and A220 service across the midwest.

An airline that connects to the regional smaller markets could bring a lot more non stop destinations

Places like-
Joplin, Cape Girardeau, Branson, Wichica, Tulsa, Omaha, Des Moines, Salina, Lincoln, Fayetteville

I picture a new airline that code shares flights into KC. A once a day on a small regional jet could bring a few hundred people daily in the aggregate.

Go a little further and flights like Little Rock to Sioux Falls via KC could be a popular business flight as an alternative to driving all day

The guy who manages air service for KCI tweeted that he is adding an JetBlue A220 to his airplane model collection.

flyingember wrote: ↑Thu Apr 22, 2021 10:12 am

normalthings wrote: ↑Wed Apr 21, 2021 6:20 pm Would love to to see us become a mini-hub with E jet and A220 service across the midwest.

An airline that connects to the regional smaller markets could bring a lot more non stop destinations

Places like-
Joplin, Cape Girardeau, Branson, Wichica, Tulsa, Omaha, Des Moines, Salina, Lincoln, Fayetteville

I picture a new airline that code shares flights into KC. A once a day on a small regional jet could bring a few hundred people daily in the aggregate.

Go a little further and flights like Little Rock to Sioux Falls via KC could be a popular business flight as an alternative to driving all day

The days of our population size and hubs to smaller cities are over. You will see more point to point flying and thats about it (MCI-RDU on AA for example or MCI-MSY on DL). The only hub that exists like this now is Salt Lake City and its probably cause its geographically isolated. Cincinnati, Memphis, St Louis, Cleveland, Milwaukee all had hubs that you mention and those days are long gone

brewcrew1000 wrote: ↑Thu Apr 22, 2021 12:54 pm The days of our population size and hubs to smaller cities are over. You will see more point to point flying and thats about it (MCI-RDU on AA for example or MCI-MSY on DL). The only hub that exists like this now is Salt Lake City and its probably cause its geographically isolated. Cincinnati, Memphis, St Louis, Cleveland, Milwaukee all had hubs that you mention and those days are long gone

In the lower 48...

If you look at the list focus cities by airlines and match to enplanement numbers, it's clear this is completely wrong.

KC is the 38th biggest airport by enplanements
Every airport bigger than KC is a focus city for an airline except for New Orleans.

San Jose, #39, is a focus city with Delta
Cleveland, #47, is a focus city for Frontier
Jacksonville, #50,
Frontier opened up in Trenton, which had no commercial service and now connects to ~10 cities. It's #150 for passengers annually.


Southwest focused on Denver, Dallas and Chicago for KC. SW could do this in St. Louis easily enough but Jet Blue is just entering the Midwest. They do short point to point flights to save money and they're not going to run regional midwest service for code sharig all into JFK or Boston, they'll run it to closer midwest city. A brand new terminal with tons of runway capacity for a new airline is the time to gain flights to new cities.

AA only has 9 nonstop flights from KC. So this code share pairing is a huge opportunity.

There's 210 airports with more than 100k enplanements.

KC has 5.4 million passengers
Imagine we could gain 2% of the passengers from
Springfield, Wichita, Omaha, Des Moines, Fayetteville, Lincoln, Tulsa

That would be 135,000 people annually. There's 137 airports with fewer people than that

Small gains add up quickly if airlines would add new destinations to KC

STL has a pretty big connection operation. 23%+ of passenger traffic in STL is connecting vs the low single digits in KC.
40% of WN traffic at STL is connecting. The STL % of connections would bring us up to 15+ million yearly enplanements.

From STL, WN serves OKC, Tulsa, Little Rock, Omaha, Witchita, and Des Moines.

I like to imagine those flights one day being transferred to KC. 6am departure from those cities would arrive in KC around 6:30 to 6:45. Just in time for a 7:15 departure from KC to the coasts. The benefit to SWA is they reduce the backtracking costs they incur in STL and give their customers a far better connecting experience.


This



vs.

This (STL)

normalthings wrote: ↑Thu Apr 22, 2021 4:08 pm STL has a pretty big connection operation. 23%+ of passenger traffic in STL is connecting vs the low single digits in KC.
40% of WN traffic at STL is connecting. The STL % of connections would bring us up to 15+ million yearly enplanements.

From STL, WN serves OKC, Tulsa, Little Rock, Omaha, Witchita, and Des Moines.

I like to imagine those flights one day being transferred to KC. 6am departure from those cities would arrive in KC around 6:30 to 6:45. Just in time for a 7:15 departure from KC to the coasts. The benefit to SWA is they reduce the backtracking costs they incur in STL and give their customers a far better connecting experience.

With a return flight arriving at 6pm in KC, back to those cities in time to get home and eat a late dinner.

Great timing for a business trip where you can arrive early Monday morning and leave work a little early the last day for the return.

These kinds of short flights are critical for KC being an HQ city. it needs to be easy for a regional business to reach regional offices without transferring in Chicago every time. Might as well put the HQ in Chicago then.

Like the two destinations I recently booked. What should be a pleasant short direct flight to a peer city involves an all day ordeal. To get to Pittsburgh a layover in Philadelphia and to get back from Louisville, a switch in Chicago.

moderne wrote: ↑Thu Apr 22, 2021 4:40 pm Like the two destinations I recently booked. What should be a pleasant short direct flight to a peer city involves an all day ordeal. To get to Pittsburgh a layover in Philadelphia and to get back from Louisville, a switch in Chicago.

It has been a while since we had an N/S service to either of those. I believe US Airways back in the day ran 3X and the only direct to Louisville was on ExpressJet (when they tried to do their own thing, in fact they may have announced it but it never actually launched '07-'08).

flyingember wrote: ↑Thu Apr 22, 2021 3:58 pm

brewcrew1000 wrote: ↑Thu Apr 22, 2021 12:54 pm The days of our population size and hubs to smaller cities are over. You will see more point to point flying and thats about it (MCI-RDU on AA for example or MCI-MSY on DL). The only hub that exists like this now is Salt Lake City and its probably cause its geographically isolated. Cincinnati, Memphis, St Louis, Cleveland, Milwaukee all had hubs that you mention and those days are long gone

In the lower 48...


KC is the 38th biggest airport by enplanements
Every airport bigger than KC is a focus city for an airline except for New Orleans.

San Jose, #39, is a focus city with Delta
Cleveland, #47, is a focus city for Frontier

Frontier is flying to MCO, MIA, LAS, LAX type cities from Cleveland they are not flying to Dayton, Buffalo, Harrisburg PA

It makes no sense anymore to fly Cincinnati to Buffalo or a Memphis to Birmingham because airlines have consolidated so much