Charlotte-Douglas Airport (CLT) Expansion

[KJHburg]

Just curious does that mean DFW will get flights to Israel and India?   That is big for DFW and will be the first flights to those countries from the state of Texas. 

[CltFlyer]

10 minutes ago, KJHburg said:

Just curious does that mean DFW will get flights to Israel and India?   That is big for DFW and will be the first flights to those countries from the state of Texas. 

AA is beginning Dallas to Tel Aviv and New York to Delhi on October 31st, and beginning Seattle-Bangalore on November 1st (served by DFW crews).  

Edited August 17, 2021 by CltFlyer

[videtur quam contuor]

 

32 minutes ago, Temeteron said:

Yeah me being Greek, it seemed weird to me as well. However the German seems weird also as most Germans can speak and understand English. 

Is that true?

Edited August 17, 2021 by tarhoosier

[Temeteron]

1 minute ago, tarhoosier said:

 

Is that true?

Most Germans that travel at least.  It’s a standard to know at least some English in Northern European countries. In parts of Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden etc they teach English at a very young age. And also require a 3rd language in grade school. 

1 minute ago, tarhoosier said:

 

Is that true?

 

[videtur quam contuor]

I am aware of western European educational practices. I wondered if more than half of the 80 million Germans had spoken fluency of English.

Icelanders, Netherlanders and maybe another Scandinavian country has 50% fluent English speakers, likely. It would surprise me if that includes Germany. (I am surprised regularly)

Edited August 17, 2021 by tarhoosier

[LKN704]

^An estimated 90% of the Dutch are fluent in English. Asking someone if they speak English in the Netherlands  is akin to asking someone if they know how to read. TV programming is often in English-only and I’ve even flown on KLM flights where not a single announcement was in Dutch-it was all English. 

Asian languages aside, these days most US carriers largely staff flights with language of destination (LOD) speaking crews mostly as a service element/sign of respect. Sure, probably the vast majority of German passengers on an AA CLT-FRA/MUC flight are fluent in English, but it’s nice to be able to speak your native language (even though I’m willing to bet only one or two flight attendants on a given AA flight to Germany can speak German) and it makes the airline more marketable overseas, especially when acquiring lucrative contracts with foreign companies. People remember small service details like that, and it does make a difference… “I was able to speak my native language on a X airlines flight, but I wasn’t able to do so on Y airlines”.

There’a a safety element for sure, but most aircraft these days have a sophisticated automated announcement system that basically negates the need to have LOD crews. 

That said, on a flight to a destination where English fluency isn’t common , say Japan, LOD crews definitely come in handy, especially during meal service. 
 

Back to Charlotte-related aviation, I still wouldn’t be surprised to see CLT again a flight to Athens eventually. 

Edited August 17, 2021 by LKN704

[Temeteron]

30 minutes ago, LKN704 said:

^An estimated 90% of the Dutch are fluent in English. Asking someone if they speak English in the Netherlands  is akin to asking someone if they know how to read. TV programming is often in English-only and I’ve even flown on KLM flights where not a single announcement was in Dutch-it was all English. 

Asian languages aside, these days most US carriers largely staff flights with language of destination (LOD) speaking crews mostly as a service element/sign of respect. Sure, probably the vast majority of German passengers on an AA CLT-FRA/MUC flight are fluent in English, but it’s nice to be able to speak your native language (even though I’m willing to bet only one or two flight attendants on a given AA flight to Germany can speak German) and it makes the airline more marketable overseas, especially when acquiring lucrative contracts with foreign companies. People remember small service details like that, and it does make a difference… “I was able to speak my native language on a X airlines flight, but I wasn’t able to do so on Y airlines”.

There’a a safety element for sure, but most aircraft these days have a sophisticated automated announcement system that basically negates the need to have LOD crews. 

That said, on a flight to a destination where English fluency isn’t common , say Japan, LOD crews definitely come in handy, especially during meal service. 
 

Back to Charlotte-related aviation, I still wouldn’t be surprised to see CLT again a flight to Athens eventually. 

I would jump for joy if that happened, although my family is from the SKG (Thessaloniki) area so I’d still have a layover lol

[InSouthPark]

20 hours ago, tarhoosier said:

 

Is that true?

Yes. I work for a German company. 1200 employees in HQ in Hamburg and every one speaks English fluently.  In the 12+ weeks I have spent in Germany (mostly for work, some for vacation), I have run across less than a handful of people that spoke no English in the cities (Hamburg/Berlin/Munich) and they were all older (60's).  Learning English has been mandatory in schools for a while now.   I don't know about out in the rural areas where they would be less exposed to English on a daily life but in the city they sure do.   

[slipperypete]

21 hours ago, tarhoosier said:

Icelanders, Netherlanders and maybe another Scandinavian country has 50% fluent English speakers, likely. It would surprise me if that includes Germany. (I am surprised regularly)

Ok, further off topic, but Iceland is around 98% English speaking proficiency.  I just looked up the stat, but having been there I can confirm that every single person I encountered spoke very functional English. From food store checkouts in small villages to pensioners with a room to let. Everybody I crossed had great English.  In fact, I recently watched Katla on Netflix and found it interesting that conversations between Icelandic and Swedish characters speak English to communicate with each other. This is despite the fact that their languages are much closer to each other in the Germanic language family than either is to English.  

If the 98% is accurate that's pretty wild, since it would mean Iceland has a higher % of proficient English speakers than the USA.  Per Wikipedia, the Netherlands, Norway and Sweden are close to each other at around 90%, just a couple of percent behind the USA.

[videtur quam contuor]

That wiki page puts Germany at 56%, and with significant qualifications on the sources for the numbers. 

I experienced Iceland with the same results as Pete. Much of entertainment in Iceland is from Britain and U. S. The Iceland language has more letters than Roman English and follows different word formation rules. They pronounce the name of their country Ees-land.

I took this photo to provide an example of the language and characters. This building contains a blood bank and donation center. "30 minutes to give". Plus other businesses. 

This is a professional motor coach company vehicle

[kermit]

My experience 3 years ago around Leipzig and Dresden suggested that only about half of the folks I interacted with (mostly shopkeepers and bartenders) volunteered to speak English once it became clear I was a hick in the former DDR. OTOH between Frankfurt and Cologne I would have guessed it was around 90% English proficient folks (damn near 100% in Berlin). Fewer english speakers in Dusseldorf, I thought.  I also found recent immigrants (my interactions were mostly with cab drivers) often had no English (but decent German). 

Edited August 18, 2021 by kermit

[InSouthPark]

1 hour ago, kermit said:

  I also found recent immigrants (my interactions were mostly with cab drivers) often had no English (but decent German). 

This is VERY true. I have to take a taxi from downtown Hamburg to our office every day and so few drivers spoke anything more than broken English. But almost none of the drivers were German.  Thank God for mytaxi app for most of my trips.  They also like to pretend to not speak english when it comes time to pay with a card and try to take you to an ATM, insisting their machine doesn't work.  Then when you refuse...they suddenly understand what you saying and then the machine suddenly works.  Get this almost every time from the airport, but never when the hotel called a cab for you. 

[LKN704]

In general, smaller countries (like Iceland, the Netherlands, Scandinavian states, Finland) tend to do better at English language instruction than larger ones. Their smaller size (both in terms of area/lack of resources and by population) requires them to be much more outward-looking/focused on trade to the point where speaking English isn't so much a luxury but rather an economic necessity. 

[KJHburg]

CLT was the 2nd busiest airport in the WORLD in June 

Flight Statistics: World's Busiest Airports In June 2021 (id1.de)

[Temeteron]

27 minutes ago, KJHburg said:

CLT was the 2nd busiest airport in the WORLD in June 

Flight Statistics: World's Busiest Airports In June 2021 (id1.de)

Pretty amazing but hard to believe 

[TCLT]

1 hour ago, KJHburg said:

CLT was the 2nd busiest airport in the WORLD in June 

Flight Statistics: World's Busiest Airports In June 2021 (id1.de)

DFW isn't on the list for all airports or north America so I'm a little suspect of this list. It has more scheduled flights and seats than CLT so not sure what's going on. I know DFW had some weather related cancellations this summer but there's no way it was so bad to knock it out of the top 20 if this data was just number of completed flights. If you look at the OAG site that this article sourced from their busiest airport list for scheduled capacity in August is ATL followed by DFW (and CLT isn't even in the top 10 for this metric).

[KJHburg]

I guess that study I quoted was number of flights but DFW is missing as noted.  But doing analysis of airports on available seats in this environment like OAG is a weird way to count airline traffic.  I would think actual passengers or flights is a better measure.  But regardless CLT is performing much better than its American peers in % of passengers since Covid hit.

Photos from today. 

[HopHead]

^Thanks for the pics... I flew in/out  of CLT last week and seeing it in person really just gives you perspective in terms of how massive that terminal expansion is...  Nice to see some of the glass starting to go in too. 

[Richhamleigh, DC]

On 8/20/2021 at 9:23 AM, KJHburg said:

CLT was the 2nd busiest airport in the WORLD in June 

Flight Statistics: World's Busiest Airports In June 2021 (id1.de)

Also amazing......non-hub RDU #17 in the US

[Temeteron]

The cancellations have been ridiculous.  My step sisters are stranded in JFK on their way to Greece.  Their Charlotte to Atlanta flight was cancelled so they took a separate one to NY. Nightmare. Anyway, apparently I read this: “Earlier this week, American said it paused plans to close down a pilot training center in Charlotte, North Carolina, because of the need for more pilots to handle the surge in travel demand.”

[xapostrophe]

2 hours ago, Temeteron said:

The cancellations have been ridiculous.  My step sisters are stranded in JFK on their way to Greece.  Their Charlotte to Atlanta flight was cancelled so they took a separate one to NY. Nightmare. Anyway, apparently I read this: “Earlier this week, American said it paused plans to close down a pilot training center in Charlotte, North Carolina, because of the need for more pilots to handle the surge in travel demand.”

It was a boneheaded decision in the first place.   The other sim center in Dallas doesn't have the capacity to cover what we need.  

 

[CltFlyer]

An updated look on AA's long term strategy.

https://simpleflying.com/american-hub-strategy/

A few points in relation to CLT.  Some good, some bad.  

-They are looking more at overflying hubs (with an example being CLT- El Paso).  As opposed to higher frequencies to nearby hubs.  This could mean more routes like SJC, ABQ, TUS, etc....

-They aren't changing their international strategy.  (CLT will not see many new TATL flights and will follow the pre-covid strategy of flights to London, high tourism markets, and Germany)

[LKN704]

Looks like a Punta Cana flight was up-gauged to a 772 for the Winter season. 

[stiluvclt]

I am surprised that one of you amazing UPers who are photoshop savvy haven't superimposed the CLT entrance Rotunda out in mid field surrounded by jetways. I would do it if I knew how.

Edited September 1, 2021 by stiluvclt

[KJHburg]

Passenger count in July 99% of its 2019 record year.  CLT continues to get closer to 2019 levels.

""Passenger traffic all but made a full return at Charlotte Douglas International Airport in July, although the full impact of the Delta variant on travel figures moving forward remains a question mark. Just shy of 4.4 million passengers boarded or departed a plane at Charlotte Douglas in July, one of the busiest travel months of the year for airlines. That number was off by less than 1% from the 4.42 million passengers recorded at the Charlotte airport in July 2019, according to CLT's most recent airline and cargo activity summary, released on Aug. 31. Data in the monthly reports comes directly from airlines.  That passenger count more than doubled from what was seen at the airport during July last year, increasing 120% from 1.99 million people. And it marked a steady gain of 4.8% from the 4.19 million people passing through CLT in June.  The load factor — the percentage of occupied seats on a plane — surpassed pre-pandemic levels at Charlotte Douglas in July. It came in at 91% — up from 88.3% two years ago and from 66.7% in July 2020. It also represented an increase from 90.1% in June.  Daily flights at CLT averaged 728 in July. That's down from 760 flights in July 2019 but nearly 56% above the 468 flights in July last year. It's about on par with the 732 average daily flights that took place in June.""

Passengers return to Charlotte airport at pre-pandemic levels but Covid surge could hinder traffic - Charlotte Business Journal (bizjournals.com)