Logan Airport Flights and Airlines Discussion

[adamh8297]

Thanks for the information. Can't wait to see the Emirates, Hainan, and Turkish planes at Logan next spring/summer. It will also be a big drawing card for the Boston area in attracting and keeping businesses.

Another random question, anyone know what the daily passenger count is for Boston-Honolulu/Hawaii?

Unfortunately Hawaii traffic is not included in the Table 6 DOT Reports

However, there is an interpolation you can make

http://www.transtats.bts.gov/DL_Sel...7&DB_Short_Name=Origin and Destination Survey

If you generate a report with this link - you get a 10% sampling of tickets generated to/from BOS. I downloaded a BOS-specific report for Q2 2013 and sorted by destination and manually counted the BOS-KOA/HNL/LIH/OGG tickets and returns. I then multiplied by 10 and did the PDEW calculation.

Here's what I got

Honolulu -103 PDEW
Maui - 34 PDEW
Kauai - 21 PDEW
Kona - 19 PDEW
Hilo - 4 PDEW

Between 150-200 people a day is probably a good estimate on average. Not enough for a non-stop flight and Hawaiian airlines isn't exactly killing it at JFK either.

 

[kmp1284]

Those numbers seem quite high. Are you sure those aren't per day both ways, which is how DOT reports are usually generated?

 

[adamh8297]

Those numbers seem quite high. Are you sure those aren't per day both ways, which is how DOT reports are usually generated?

I was surprised too but its PDEW. Its not 100% since it is a 10% sample.

In the csv the individual tickets are listed as BOS-HNL and HNL-BOS.

1) I added up all of the BOS-HNL and then the HNL-BOS. Did the same for KOA, OGG, LIH, and ITO.

2) Multiplied by 10 since this assumes 10% of the tickets.

3) Divided by 91 since that was the number of days in quarter 2 of 2013.

4) Divided by 2 to account for both ways.


I'll do some more quarters when I get the chance just to compare. Its a bit time consuming. I'll do a destination with a concrete table 6 amount as well.

 

[kmp1284]

Like most leisure routes it probably fluctuates wildly throughout the week with maybe 300-400 flying out on a Saturday and 50 on a Wednesday.

 

[BosDevelop]

Like most leisure routes it probably fluctuates wildly throughout the week with maybe 300-400 flying out on a Saturday and 50 on a Wednesday.

Then based on those numbers, why isn't a 1-2X/week BOS-HNL non-stop viable? Too many leisure travelers and not enough business ones to make the route profitable given the fuel involved? Not worth it to start operations at a new airport for 1-2 flights per week? Some sort of combination?

 

[kmp1284]

Then based on those numbers, why isn't a 1-2X/week BOS-HNL non-stop viable? Too many leisure travelers and not enough business ones to make the route profitable given the fuel involved? Not worth it to start operations at a new airport for 1-2 flights per week? Some sort of combination?

All of the above. Frankly it's such an improbable occurrence I'm not even going to go into it more than that. It's like talking about what one would buy if they hit the lottery.

 

[adamh8297]

All of the above. Frankly it's such an improbable occurrence I'm not even going to go into it more than that. It's like talking about what one would buy if they hit the lottery.

Simple story

2008 - I went to Kona on a dive trip. I burned 35000 miles and my friend paid 850 from BOS with connection in LA. The dive guide just flew in from LAX and he paid 850 for just the LA - Kona flight. Its easy to do the math on this one.

 

[adamh8297]

i'll do a destination with a concrete table 6 amount as well.

I chose Des Moines Iowa with a table 6 PDEW of 57.5 PDEW.

I had to run separate tables for New Hampshire and Rhode Island to get the MHT and PVD numbers since Table 6 adds in all three airports for the Boston number.

BOS - 49.9
PVD - 6.9
MHT 4.6

61.4 PDEW so the table overestimated by about 7%.

Also added up Boston- Anchorage Alaska and got 53 PDEW.

 

[Oakley]

Unfortunately Hawaii traffic is not included in the Table 6 DOT Reports

However, there is an interpolation you can make

http://www.transtats.bts.gov/DL_Sel...7&DB_Short_Name=Origin and Destination Survey

If you generate a report with this link - you get a 10% sampling of tickets generated to/from BOS. I downloaded a BOS-specific report for Q2 2013 and sorted by destination and manually counted the BOS-KOA/HNL/LIH/OGG tickets and returns. I then multiplied by 10 and did the PDEW calculation.

Here's what I got

Honolulu -103 PDEW
Maui - 34 PDEW
Kauai - 21 PDEW
Kona - 19 PDEW
Hilo - 4 PDEW

Between 150-200 people a day is probably a good estimate on average. Not enough for a non-stop flight and Hawaiian airlines isn't exactly killing it at JFK either.

You knew why I asked when you said JFK (the JetBlue-Hawaiian link).

I'm actually surprised it's that high. The yields can't be too great though.

 

[adamh8297]

You knew why I asked when you said JFK (the JetBlue-Hawaiian link).

I'm actually surprised it's that high. The yields can't be too great though.

Spot on with the yields. Here's some more perspective.

Non-stops to London are roughly $1300 for July and 1-stop Honolulu flights are roughly $1100 with an extra 1500 miles of traveling.

Here's 2012 Q2 Data as promised - All numbers in PDEW (estimated of course)

Not a big difference year to year. I'll do some more when I get time and will definitely do a pre-internet travel year.

Honolulu - 108
Kona - 14
Maui - 33
Kauai - 20
Hilo - 4

 

[adamh8297]

Massport released December 2013 traffic today.

Total Passengers for the year was 30,218,631 up 3.4%

Total International Passengers for the year was 4,545,799 up 3.7%

Europe growth was basically flat +0.2%. Beside huge increases in Asia/Central America due to the newer flights starting or completing a few year Caribbean growth was up 8.8%.

Both the Panama City flight and the Tokyo flight had loads around 80% for the month.

 

[mass88]

Nice to see Logan top 30 million passengers. I wonder if they'll be able to sustain the growth in 2014? I am sure the new flights to Istanbul, Dubai and Beijing will help.

Hopefully these new flights will be grabbing people from all over New England to fill the seats.

It's still pretty crazy that in a 3 year span, Boston has added non-stop flights to Istanbul, Panama City, Dubai, Tokyo and Beijing.

 

[Oakley]

Interesting stats.

Slightly off-topic, but any chance we could see JetBlue open a lounge similar to one they have at JFK?

 

[LH421]

Interesting stats.

Slightly off-topic, but any chance we could see JetBlue open a lounge similar to one they have at JFK?

There is no jetBlue operated lounge at JFK T5, it is operated by a third party, Airspace Lounge. That said with the United Club closing due to their relocation to B this spring and jetBlue will have over 100 daily flights Airspace, American Express Centurion, or The Club may see the value in adding an independent lounge in Terminal C. Amex particularly has aggressive plans to expand their lounge footprint so they may be pursuing space here.

 

[Arlington]

I could be wrong but I don't see the numbers adding up favorably in Boston. JetBlue is known to lose money here. it's fairly clear that they have slowed expansion substantially and with potential growth from Delta and American and their high value FFs and corporate contracts, JetBlue remains in a challenging spot. they have excelled in the number of leisure oriented and even some moderately sized business markets but they lack the ability to compete where it truly matters to business travelers - Washington, New York, San Francisco and Chicago.

It seems like JetBlue's acquisition of 12 new r/t slots at DCA help for Washington. They may not need to match the AA and DL schedules, to have a "good enough" pattern considering JetBlue's nonstops elsewhere.

Even just 2 DCA round trips for the benefit of Bostonians (AM southbound, PM return) would give hourly service 6:15am to 12:15pm and then hourly returns 4:15pm to 9:15pm, Slot pair 3 &4 could be a 2:15pm pair and 1:15 south /3:15 north, which would seem to be "good enough" as part of a larger corporate package.

Slot pair 5 gives them hourlies 6:15am to 9:15pm--and still 7 to play with at DCA to florida or even some "infill" in New England, DCA-BDL/PVD/HPN, for companies (and better station utilization)

 

[LH421]

I could be wrong but I don't see the numbers adding up favorably in Boston. JetBlue is known to lose money here. it's fairly clear that they have slowed expansion substantially and with potential growth from Delta and American and their high value FFs and corporate contracts, JetBlue remains in a challenging spot. they have excelled in the number of leisure oriented and even some moderately sized business markets but they lack the ability to compete where it truly matters to business travelers - Washington, New York, San Francisco and Chicago.

Yes jetBlue has publicly stated BOS in a whole is not profitable, however it takes time for them to reach that point especially after the tremendous growth they have had in this market. Remember a decade ago they were just launching service from terminal E to a small handful of destinations, no one at the time imagined the scale of their expansion plans. While I don't have any inside knowledge I would imagine they are committed to the market, BOS is very strategic and they will be assuming the UA gates in Terminal C and will then control the entire terminal. I think also with the international expansion at Logan we will see them focus more on international connections, they even went as far to say the new Detroit flights were timed for connections with Emirates (given the large Arab population in Detroit area).

 

[mass88]

I would assume the losses JetBlue has taken in Boston are not so large as to make them think twice about the expansion they've undertaken in the laat 3 years.

In reality, there aren't a lot of cities that JetBlue could expand to from Boston. They already fly non-stop to most of the cities in their network.

 

[Arlington]

I didn't realize they had that many flights. The issue with these flights is that while the morning and even flights are typically full, the daytime flights experience extremely poor loads, in the range of 20% at times. I think with the corporate contracts and FF base, US has a major advantage in pulling some revenue out of those flights.

It surprised me too. Until the whole "what will JetBlue do with its DCA slots?" question ripened these last 2 days, I would have said JetBlue flew DCA-BOS 5x daily...not the 9.5x that they actually do.

And the cool thing is (and as you point out) they don't really need to fly between 11am and 4pm. Maybe 12x r/t and they've got what they need for BOS, and can work on things like ORD and DAL gates.

I sure would like to see JetBlue get access to Love Field when AA's gates there come up for sale (though, in that case, Delta is said to be hard to outbid). BOS-DAL and JFK-DAL and LGB-DAL and FLL-DAL would be great JetBlue markets

 

[mass88]

Southwest is supposed to be releasing their new DAL - Love Field schedule for the fall (September) on Monday. I wonder if we'll see some DAL-BOS non-stop flights.

 

[adamh8297]

Yes jetBlue has publicly stated BOS in a whole is not profitable, however it takes time for them to reach that point especially after the tremendous growth they have had in this market. Remember a decade ago they were just launching service from terminal E to a small handful of destinations, no one at the time imagined the scale of their expansion plans. While I don't have any inside knowledge I would imagine they are committed to the market, BOS is very strategic and they will be assuming the UA gates in Terminal C and will then control the entire terminal. I think also with the international expansion at Logan we will see them focus more on international connections, they even went as far to say the new Detroit flights were timed for connections with Emirates (given the large Arab population in Detroit area).

BOS made a profit every year EXCEPT for 2011 - check slide 12 of 2013 Analyst Day.

http://phx.corporate-ir.net/Externa...9NDk4MjIyfENoaWxkSUQ9NTM3NjcwfFR5cGU9MQ==&t=1

This quarter may be a different story due to weather though.