I don't know labrat if it's the southwestern equivalent then why aren't there the same amount of cargo ops going on there compared to YIP? Hmmm looking at cargo ops in 2005 ELP had 86,235 tons of cargo go through and YPI has about 200,000 tons based from both of the airport sites. About the only thing El Paso is good for is cargo movement between the US and Mexico, there are a ton of cities in Texas that cargo carriers can be based at to move freight up north, so I don't see your logic. A lot of smaller freight outfits base there ops out of there? who? Anyways, there are plenty of places in the country where small air cargo ops are based out of, I don't think that should make it a cargo hub. The airport cargo site listing the carriers has airborne, bax, dhl, fedex, egl, emery, and ups, seems pretty standard for an airport of that size. I don't know man, I'm not convinced nor is the air cargo industry yet obviously that ELP should be a cargo "hub" of the southwest.

 

When asked about where you would hub a new airline, I answered either San Diego or Sacramento.

Well, ExpressJet has announced that they are beginning their own branded flying. Their three large cities are, you guessed it:
San Diego
Ontario
Sacramento

Out of every city ExpressJet branded flying flies to west of the Mississippi, two or three of the routes are through SAN, ONT, and SMF.

The NEWEST airline hub's in the country since this post was written are in Sacramento and San Diego. INTERESTING!!! Maybe the 22 year old CFI is not so dumb afterall. I love it when people call me wrong, and then they are COMPLETELY wrong!
Ok, rant over.

 

Hong Kong Baby,

Good facilities, impossible departure and engine -out procedures, and Disney Land. At night, the union meetings could be held at Sticky Fingers.

Just my 2 cents

 

TWA, Braniff, Eastern, USair (the old one), all tried to make KCI a HUB............................conceptually it makes sense, but see a PATTERN?

 

WRONG!!!!

As any current or former Airline Exec. and they will tell you the first thing that an airline looks at when deciding to make a particular airport a hub is "O and D" which stands for, Origin and Destination. This is the number of passengers (or potential # of passengers), who will originate or terminate their travel at that airport, meaning the 'local traffic base.' Most airlines (including Southwest), want a hub to be supported by 2/3 local traffic.

Many cities mentioned in this thread so far do not have the local traffic base (local feed) to support a 'hub' operation, as they just don't have a large enough local population base, not enough business travel, etc. Why do you think at least 2-3 major airlines have tried to have a hub operation at KMCI (just to pick one mentioned), and was not successful as a good hub operation. Eastern and Braniff failed, but talk to the people who worked there at the time (or read up on the companies), it was not a 'profitable or good' operation for either. US Air Finally (thank god they came to their senses), and closed PIT as a hub. Excellent facilities, nice runways, taxi-ways, nice terminal; however, PIT as a city does not have the local traffic base (not a large enough population base, tooooo many old industries, steel, etc), to support a 'major hub' operation. US Air still has a major presence there, but it was officially closed as a hub some time ago.

And they don't just look at the surrounding population base (but that is a major factor), but the amount of business/industry to generate business travelers.

Just think for a minute, and look at all the the 'major hub airports' in this country and even without doing any research, think about the population base around most of these airports: JFK/EWR, ORD, DTW, CLT, ORD, DEN, DFW, IAH, and so on. About the only one mentioned in this whole thread that 'could' have potential would be STL. Problems, airport authority wants (from what I have heard), really high fees (lease rates, gates etc, to pay for the money invested in the new facilities), and also two automatic competitors who already have a 'footing' there, SWA and AA. Either or both of whom could easily increase operations there to hurt longterm growth.

Well, that's enough, but you get the point, (and it only took what 4 pages), its not just about 'connecting' people on planes. If the business (locally) is not there, it will NEVER be a successful hub.

DA

P.S. And, just to add, why do you think NWA has downsized MEM, and virtually closed that as 'hub,' Not enough local traffic.