Y'all understand, don't you, that I don't have seats on my shiny (well, it used to be shiny, anyway) jet, so my participation in this discussion is purely academic, and my initial remark was sparked by the "profound" statement that it takes more gas to fly longer legs.


Given your assertion that the real value must be determined by looking not only at fuel CASM (which introduces seats to the equation when I was looking simply at leg lengths) but also at RASM, a better answer to my question of optimum leg length would be to match a graph of fuel CASM and RASM. If fuel CASM drops off with leg length, but RASM drops off more quickly, where do those two intersect? How would the RASM graph be affected by a change in fare structure? What would be the comparative effects of single-class service versus two- or three-class service? How would it be affected by discount fares for round trips or off-peak periods of service? How would it be affected by fare premiums for refundable tickets or last-minute travellers? Indeed, there are many, many factors that affect RASM, and the graph would seem to be an elusive target to pin down.


So, with the fuel CASM curve and the bouncing RASM curve, it would seem that the optimum leg length for fuel cost economy would seem to involve much more than the simple statement that "shorter haul flying uses less fuel." Take that one step further and you can convincingly argue that parking the airplanes will reduce the fuel costs to zero. (Perhaps I should have just said that instead of "profound" in the first place. )


Hence, my facetious remark.






- The truth only hurts when it should -