KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

Transportation topics in KC
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AlkaliAxel
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Re: KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

Post by AlkaliAxel »

GRID wrote: Wed Jul 20, 2022 9:52 am So rather than flying direct by driving to StL and parking there in 3-4 hours, you would prefer to fly to MSP, DIA, ATL, JFK etc?
Yes
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Re: KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

Post by normalthings »

GRID wrote: Wed Jul 20, 2022 9:52 am So rather than flying direct by driving to StL and parking there in 3-4 hours, you would prefer to fly to MSP, DIA, ATL, JFK etc? Which not only would add about the same time or more to the trip, but add an additional flight that could be delayed or canceled and route your luggage through another flight as well?

It's an honest question. I guess it also matters if you are flying direct to your destination in Europe. I avoid connecting in Europe as well, but we have the luxury of having non stop flights to just about any major city in the world from DC and especially from NYC. For example, right now airports like Heathrow are a total disaster so unless your destination is London, I would avoid making a connection there like the plague.

I HATE connecting even for domestic flights. I can't remember the last time I didn't fly non stop.
Driving to STL takes 3.5-6 hours. It’s really easy to get caught up in traffic, construction, or a wreck that can massively impact travel time. When you drive to STL and show up late, it’s your fault. When I fly from KC to Chicago and it’s late, it’s the airlines fault and they pay/fix it.

I was looking at Feb/March trips from STL vs Chicago on Lufthansa. STL is 3-4 times more expensive for the same dates
Last edited by normalthings on Wed Jul 20, 2022 12:16 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

Post by earthling »

Plus many would rather sit in an airport for connections (can work, surf, whatever) than actively drive.
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AlkaliAxel
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Re: KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

Post by AlkaliAxel »

earthling wrote: Wed Jul 20, 2022 12:16 pm Plus many would rather sit in an airport for connections (can work, surf, whatever) than actively drive.
Yep. My favorite thing during a connection is to surf. Love to bring my board and catch those waves just before a flight. Just have to remember to bring a swimsuit though.
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Re: KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

Post by dev49 »

hartliss wrote: Wed Jul 20, 2022 8:50 am
dev49 wrote: Mon Jul 18, 2022 3:30 pm
hartliss wrote: Mon Jul 18, 2022 12:54 pm

Do you subscribe to Enilria's Patreon page for updates or are you pulling your own? https://www.patreon.com/Enilria/posts
Both.

I got the original overall 52% from him but individual routes I download the spreadsheet from Transtats or whatever it is.
Nice, yea, me too. Good content. He used to post on a.net but now he is charging for it, which is smart!
I feel a little silly paying but the weekly schedule updates keep me going back.
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Re: KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

Post by GRID »

normalthings wrote: Wed Jul 20, 2022 12:14 pm
GRID wrote: Wed Jul 20, 2022 9:52 am So rather than flying direct by driving to StL and parking there in 3-4 hours, you would prefer to fly to MSP, DIA, ATL, JFK etc? Which not only would add about the same time or more to the trip, but add an additional flight that could be delayed or canceled and route your luggage through another flight as well?

It's an honest question. I guess it also matters if you are flying direct to your destination in Europe. I avoid connecting in Europe as well, but we have the luxury of having non stop flights to just about any major city in the world from DC and especially from NYC. For example, right now airports like Heathrow are a total disaster so unless your destination is London, I would avoid making a connection there like the plague.

I HATE connecting even for domestic flights. I can't remember the last time I didn't fly non stop.
Driving to STL takes 3.5-6 hours. It’s really easy to get caught up in traffic, construction, or a wreck that can massively impact travel time. When you drive to STL and show up late, it’s your fault. When I fly from KC to Chicago and it’s late, it’s the airlines fault and they pay/fix it.

I was looking at Feb/March trips from STL vs Chicago on Lufthansa. STL is 3-4 times more expensive for the same dates
lol, I used to drive to StL from KC many times a year and it was never more than 3.5 hours, most of the time it was under 3 especially to Lambert or the western suburbs. I'm not even sure how you could make it take as long as six hours. You are talking about 70 right and not I-95? Even 95 rarely has 2-3 hour delays over 250 miles. I get it though. Not everybody likes to drive.
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Re: KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

Post by normalthings »

It’s 3.5 hours on a good day at speed limit. 4.5 hours if you hit a rush hour. Do this 7 rts a year for the last few. Have also driven to STL to catch a cheaper flight (not worth it),
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Re: KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

Post by alejandro46 »

Yep, the only thing is I have considered driving to Chicago to stay w family and fly out international from ORD, except the woule trip turned out to be cheaper to fly from MCI through ORD, basically the airline placed a premium on the direct international routes from Chicago vs. from MCI where I chould have flown through a number of cities.
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Re: KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

Post by dev49 »

I am sure some people would make the drive to STL. I am sure plenty of people drive from Indy and STL to Chicago to take flights. But I can’t imagine that number is very big. I also think cost factors in heavily. If the STL flight is cheaper then yes, but if it’s about the same it is probably less likely.
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Re: KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

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dev49 wrote: Wed Jul 20, 2022 2:43 pm I am sure some people would make the drive to STL. I am sure plenty of people drive from Indy and STL to Chicago to take flights. But I can’t imagine that number is very big. I also think cost factors in heavily. If the STL flight is cheaper then yes, but if it’s about the same it is probably less likely.
Also add. Frequent fliers and/or business is not going to drive
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Re: KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

Post by Cratedigger »

Know people that drove from Omaha to KC for the Icelandair flight.

I personally wouldn't do it and would rather connect. But there are people out there that will make that drive
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Re: KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

Post by GRID »

I'm not talking about biz flights etc. I'm more talking about the family 2-3 with trip to Europe. I don't fly to Frankfurt for London for a 3 day business trip. I also don't know how it breaks down, but when I fly overseas, it sure as hell feels like 90% of those on the plane are families and couples traveling for pleasure.

All I'm saying is that it's worth it to me to take a train or drive to NYC for a flight to save money plus drop a connection that drastically increases the chances of a travel disruption. I mean our multi week international trips would be wrecked by just showing up a day or two late, so cutting out a connecting flight is worth it to me if at all possible.

So I just thought that maybe some would make the drive from various parts of the midwest to catch rare transatlantic flights from KC or StL.
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Re: KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

Post by trexel94 »

Gov Parsons will be making trips to Germany and The Netherlands to promote trade with Missouri. No mention on anything particular for KC or STL but reading between the lines, it looks increasingly likely we'll end up with either DL or LH Group launching a flight. It makes me wonder if Meyers recent trip has any connection to Parsons upcoming visit. Honestly I'm disappointed he's not visiting the UK. I wanted BA as MCI-LHR is the only unserved European pairing from KC with any real O/D and by far the most traffic in addition to being KC's biggest European trading partner. Not sure where we stand with Germany or The Netherlands in terms of trade.

https://www.kmov.com/2022/07/20/gov-par ... -location/
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Re: KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

Post by normalthings »

GRID wrote: Wed Jul 20, 2022 3:22 pm I'm not talking about biz flights etc. I'm more talking about the family 2-3 with trip to Europe. I don't fly to Frankfurt for London for a 3 day business trip. I also don't know how it breaks down, but when I fly overseas, it sure as hell feels like 90% of those on the plane are families and couples traveling for pleasure.

All I'm saying is that it's worth it to me to take a train or drive to NYC for a flight to save money plus drop a connection that drastically increases the chances of a travel disruption. I mean our multi week international trips would be wrecked by just showing up a day or two late, so cutting out a connecting flight is worth it to me if at all possible.

So I just thought that maybe some would make the drive from various parts of the midwest to catch rare transatlantic flights from KC or StL.
There isn’t really a cost benefit. Pro is potentially avoiding a connection but you loose the convenience by having to drive to STL. It’s great if you fly out of STL normally but not useful if you are a KC flyer.

In your example, DC to NYC is easy, cheap, and reliable to get to. Not the same as KC to STL, can be extremely variable.
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Re: KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

Post by dev49 »

^really the main way I would see it happening is as grid mentions is families. If you have a family of 4 and can save $250 a ticket that’s $1000 and worth the drive. Not sure how often it will be that much savings. But I can see it in that case.
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Re: KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

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dev49 wrote: Thu Jul 21, 2022 11:56 am ^really the main way I would see it happening is as grid mentions is families. If you have a family of 4 and can save $250 a ticket that’s $1000 and worth the drive. Not sure how often it will be that much savings. But I can see it in that case.
I’ve been looking at a few fall trips to Europe. This is the general idea of how prices stack up (all Lufthansa). Lufthansa being a premium career and charging a direct flight premium doesn’t make a good compelling case for KC VFR traffic.
Obviously these prices vary but I’ve been pricing trips for this summer, fall, spring, and next summer and this theme has been pretty consistent.

KC-FRA-XXX final destination

$1200 KC Lufthansa with United domestic connection
$800 KC AA or Delta
$1000 STL
$400 Chicago
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Re: KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

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dev49 wrote: Thu Jul 21, 2022 11:56 am ^really the main way I would see it happening is as grid mentions is families. If you have a family of 4 and can save $250 a ticket that’s $1000 and worth the drive. Not sure how often it will be that much savings. But I can see it in that case.
Even two people it adds up. Flights direct from NYC are often much cheaper and they have far more options. We just flew from Dulles to Rome nonstop and paid a bit more so we could have a non stop, but wasn't that much more. Next year we are looking at flying 5 people in our group to Singapore and then on to Australia. Flights on Singapore airlines are much cheaper from NYC. Plus, they have a direct flight from Newark to Singapore. Still trying to decide, but it looks like we are going to go with the direct 18 hour flight vs making a connection in Frankfurt or something.

So we plan to take the train from BWI to Newark and since we won't have a car, it makes things easier coming back since we will be coming back from New Zealand probably via CA or TX to a DC area airport.

But last year we flew to Frankfurt with three people and it was 400 cheaper per person to fly from JFK from Dulles. So we made the drive. I'm sure we could have gotten tickets cheaper by flying through chicago or something, but again, I prefer a direct flight. I would rather spend 3 hours on a train or driving than on a layover in Detroit or MSP or something.
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Re: KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

Post by normalthings »

GRID wrote: Thu Jul 21, 2022 3:42 pm
dev49 wrote: Thu Jul 21, 2022 11:56 am ^really the main way I would see it happening is as grid mentions is families. If you have a family of 4 and can save $250 a ticket that’s $1000 and worth the drive. Not sure how often it will be that much savings. But I can see it in that case.
Even two people it adds up. Flights direct from NYC are often much cheaper and they have far more options. We just flew from Dulles to Rome nonstop and paid a bit more so we could have a non stop, but wasn't that much more. Next year we are looking at flying 5 people in our group to Singapore and then on to Australia. Flights on Singapore airlines are much cheaper from NYC. Plus, they have a direct flight from Newark to Singapore. Still trying to decide, but it looks like we are going to go with the direct 18 hour flight vs making a connection in Frankfurt or something.

So we plan to take the train from BWI to Newark and since we won't have a car, it makes things easier coming back since we will be coming back from New Zealand probably via CA or TX to a DC area airport.

But last year we flew to Frankfurt with three people and it was 400 cheaper per person to fly from JFK. So we made the drive.
100% understand what you are saying. My disagreement is that STL Lufthansa is at a price premium to just flying from KC based on my experiences and much much more expensive than hoping up to Chicago. (I usually check flights at least once a week for my trip wish list)

From what I’ve seen, an STL family can save a ton of money just taking the train to Chicago.
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Re: KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

Post by GRID »

^ obviously if the prices are high then my points are mostly mute. People will still route out of JFK etc.

We are pretty lucky to have NYC close on top of all the internarial flights out of IAD and BWI. I think just moving out here has made us international travelers. Everybody out here seems to have a passport and travels internationally regularly. People out here travel way more international than domestic for pleasure it seems like. I mean most people I interact with know nothing about the USA between DC and LA but could tell you all about Europe. Which I think is stupid too. America has a lot to offer too.

Most people I know back home barely travel the USA let alone the world.
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Re: KCI Flight Schedule Adjustments

Post by KCPowercat »

If I'm connecting in ATL or Frankfurt, it's still a connection and it's easier to connect at a domestic airport. Not many are wanting to end up in Frankfurt?

Now two connections versus one maybe I consider it but I still am probably not driving to STL for that.

That said, when we get a Europe direct I'm going to enjoy having that first hop be the long hop but I'm probably still going to be connecting in whatever european city the KCI flight lands in.
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