Metro Orlando Airport News

[Camillo Sitte]

even though orlando is not the "best" geographically located city for a hub..... it is a much better choice than having an airline with NO hub in the south at all. the southern cities would go through orlando. their costs would go down dramatically.

UNITED ALREADY HAS A HUB IN THE SOUTH - IT IS CALLED CHARLOTTE [CLT]!

Rather than spend the money to develope a hub out of thin air they decided to buy into USAirs exsisting system thus giving them new hubs in the south and the desert southwest.

Edited January 12, 2008 by Camillo Sitte

[shardoon]

UNITED ALREADY HAS A HUB IN THE SOUTH - IT IS CALLED CHARLOTTE [CLT]!

Rather than spend the money to develope a hub out of thin air they decided to buy into USAirs exsisting system thus giving them new hubs in the south and the desert southwest.

you are right. i was unaware of the codeshare agreement. i guess its a matter of their current economic stability. at some point when the domestic airlines start to make money again (which they are starting to do), the profitability of having their own hub with filled profitable (all $$$ to themselves) routes will outweigh their current agreement with usairways.

the problem is that they will need to put a little capital into developing the hub. for a company that is just coming out of bankrupcy, they will not do this in the near future.

however, our main disagreement was over the viability of orlando as a hub. and if/when they decide to upgrade (put money into a new hub) and have a higher profit margin, orlando would be the only logical choice.

the main arguement that you made was that orlando would never make sense to be a hub. in this case, it would if/when united wants to upgrade and make more money for themselves. airline passenger counts are increasing every year here in the states and globally. its only a matter of time that they outgrow their codeshare agreement. when they do, although you dont want to admit it, orlando will be the only capable city in the south to create a hub. also much to your denial, it would be more profitable for them to have an orlando hub then being squeezed by the codeshare limitations with the ever increasing amount of airline passengers.

BOTTOM LINE: orlando is definetely a viable location for an airline that doesnt have a hub in the south and needs to expand.

its like beating a dead horse with this arguement. we agree to disagree, lets put it at that.

Edited January 12, 2008 by shardoon

[Camillo Sitte]

BOTTOM LINE: orlando is definetely a viable location for an airline that doesnt have a hub in the south and needs to expand.

You can say that as many times as you would like, hoping that simply repeating it enough times might make it so but the fact that no major airline ever has or currently has plans on making a hub out of Orlando is pretty much proof positive that Orlando's location prohibits it from working as a hub.

its like beating a dead horse with this arguement. we agree to disagree, lets put it at that.

LOL!

It's not a matter of you and I disagreeing, it's a matter of the entire commercial airline industry telling you that you are wrong.

[shrug][/shrug]

[speck76]

united's hubs/focus cities are:

O'Hare International Airport

Denver International Airport

Washington Dulles International Airport

San Francisco International Airport

Los Angeles International Airport

think about all the traffic from one of the fastest growing regions of the united states : southeast.

now you ask what cities? how about every major city in the central and eastern side of texas (san antonio, austin, dallas, houston, etc), new orleans, atlanta, miami, ft lauderdale, southwest florida, tally, knoxville, chatanooga, memphis, shreveport, little rock, columbia, key west, etc.

all these cities are straight line less distance or equadistant to orlando than from any one of united's other hubs. im sorry, but i "GET" the hub system and this makes sense for united under the traditional hub system that you claim to know better than everyone else. it would be less traveling for anybody in one of the nation's fastest growing regions to get to those cities through an orlando hub than an existing hub. there would be no problem filling up seats.

why dont you stop thinking one dimentionally here. there are also other factors here than simple "geography" as you put it. this would unclog the airspace and delays for united. think about the landing/takeoff slots that they would save while reducing congestion at ORD. its called spreading the field and decreasing the bottlenecks.

it would be "cool" for orlando to be a hub, but my arguement is not just for the "coolness" sake.

so actually, for united...... there are plenty of cities for them to fly to out of orlando as a hub and would fill most of the seats. i can not emphasize more to you that united has NO hub in the south ANYWHERE. dont forget that while having an existing hub in orlando, they will also be primed for future expansion to latin america (and open routes at a slow rate.... not expanding too fast like in the past).

here is an easy example for you, somebody from ANYWHERE in the southeast (80 plus million people) wanting to go to any of the cities mentioned would benefit from this. it would overall save united money from gas and save people time.

no, im sorry to inform you, i do get it.

lastly, orlando has the space for all of this. im sure if united came to the GOAA and stated their intentions, dirt would be moving on the south terminal by now.

Do you REALLY think you are smarter than EVERY airline currently in operation? Do you think that you have the answer to their success that they simply have not been able to find?

Probably not.

[FrigginGr8est]

Do you REALLY think you are smarter than EVERY airline currently in operation? Do you think that you have the answer to their success that they simply have not been able to find?

Probably not.

America's airlines proved how smart they are by losing billions over the past 7 years, deferring upgrading their fleets (Northwest Airlines average age of its planes is OVER 30 years) with many of the majors going through bankruptcy. Rather than losing landing slots and gates at busy airports, our smart airlines would rather fly empty planes to keep them. So maybe their model isn't working and needs to be reworked. Sucess? What sucess?

[shardoon]

Do you REALLY think you are smarter than EVERY airline currently in operation? Do you think that you have the answer to their success that they simply have not been able to find?

Probably not.

i dont know, it doesnt seem like they are very successful now does it. how many filed for bankrupcy?

now most created their regional hubs before orlando had much of their airport infrastructure in place. it would be too expensive to move a hub and quite frankly, the existing hubs ARE located in better geographic areas than orlando.

my point is that there ARE no other airports in the south that can handle a new major airline hub. for an airline that needs to develop their OWN hub in the south, orlando is really the only choice.

speck, excuse me, but where did i say that delta, nwa, american should create a hub in orlando? i am talking about united who does not have a southern hub. camillo can harp all he wants about the codeshare agreement they have with usairways, but with the ever increasing passenger counts..... that isnt going to cut it in the future. there will be a time when they need to expand. that is how every business works. they will eventually need to create their own hub.

once again, where the hell did i say that the answer to all airline's woes are to come to orlando? i think you need to re-read my posts since you obviously didnt catch my point at all. i am just saying that when an airline needs to expand with their own hub in the south, orlando will be the only viable location that can handle it.

camillo, bottom line is that charlotte is usairway's hub. it is now and will be in the future. what happens to united when they consistently sell off all their seats alotted to them through charlotte and there is rising passenger demand for more seats. do you think that usairways is going to offer more seats to them when they could make the money on their own? what world do you live in? once that happens, united, who is a competing domestic airline, will be pushed off of usairway's planes once whatever contract they signed permits.

once again, i dont claim that i know better than the airline industry (although i dont seem to think i could have done any worse then them). i am simply projecting what the future might hold with rising passenger demand. i am not citicizing any of the airlines for choosing memphis, dallas, charlotte, atl, houston etc as their hubs. they are better locations. however, where does an airline go once they outgrow their existing codeshare agreement to run passengers through a southern hub? the only other airport i can think of in the south is raleigh, but that is too far north for significant overlap with the washington hub. raligh once was american's hub, but the overlap killed off its main function.

Edited January 12, 2008 by shardoon

[commentator]

Its "Wayports" not wayport. Go to the Wayports website at www.wayports.com or google the word Wayports to understand the concept. Wayports is a long-term 30-40 year nationwide system and is the air equivalent of the Interstate Highway System. Only 2 new large hub airports have been built at Denver and Dallas in the last 50 years and both replaced existing airports. No supplemental airports like Wayports have ever been built. During the last 50 years billions have been spent on Interstate Highways with millions spent every year to off-load and relieve surface congestion on local roads and highways. Orlando International was developed from an abandoned military base and is the equivalent of Denver and Dallas. OIA has a massive reservoir of capacity for passengers, cargo, USPS and express mail and next generation large aircraft like the A380 and B747-400. It is the only large hub airport on the East Coast with massive long-term capacity. OIA is a spoke in the hub and spoke system and is directly impacted when the hubs that have up to 80% connections like Charlotte and Cincnatti and Atlanta with 75% get bogged down. This is one of the reasons the hub system needs to be fixed. You have hit on the problem and it needs to be discussed nationwide and not just in Orlando.

OK, I think I see the confusion here. I think you are confusing hubs and wayports.

A hub is an airport that an airline uses to connect a large number of flights. A hub is connected to a number of other cities by direct flights, and flight arrival and departure times are coordinated so that passengers arriving on one flight are able to board a flight departing for another city within reasonable times. Most airlines utilize a number of hubs.

a wayport is one central airport in which ALL flights would theoretically fly into. Passengers from one flight would have to board a flight bound for a destination city, as a wayport does not serve local communities. Most wayport concepts involve one airline per wayport, although this is not absolutely required. Currently there are no real wayports in existence.

The big difference between a hub and a wayport, is that a hub serves both a local community AND as a connection point. A hub may be dominated by a particular carrier, but is not exclusive to that carrier. Some airports serve as a hub to multiple airlines. The other big difference between the most common forms of hubs and wayports is that an airline would have multiple hubs, serving different regions, while they would only have one wayport, centrally located.

So in our example, AirMerica, with a hub in Orlando, would connect flights in the souther united states to Orlando. It would also serve a number of more popular destinations outside the region, as well as to other hubs. If you were flying from a southern airport to a major city, or from a major city to a southern airport, you would connect through Orlando. If, on the other hand, you were maybe flying from Spokane, WA to Phoenix, AZ, you might connect through their San Diego hub. Anotherwords, a hub does not connect every last airport, and does not provide the sole location of connection.

Keep in mind that a hub is not a profit device. An airline cannot charge a passenger for flying through a hub (well, not over handedly). A hub is a way to to take a small number of passengers flying from one airport to another, and consolidate them with passengers from other regional airports flying to that same destination. Although it involves flying more miles, it can consolidate and cut costs.

[Camillo Sitte]

America's airlines proved how smart they are by losing billions over the past 7 years, deferring upgrading their fleets (Northwest Airlines average age of its planes is OVER 30 years) with many of the majors going through bankruptcy. Rather than losing landing slots and gates at busy airports, our smart airlines would rather fly empty planes to keep them. So maybe their model isn't working and needs to be reworked. Sucess? What sucess?

The problems legacy airlines are experiencing today are because of high fuel prices and high labor costs. It doesn't have anything to do with scheduling or hub-n-spoke route systems.

The last dagger to the heart of the legacy carriers is the invention of the Internet and e-mail/video-conferencing/FAX machine.

Most legacy carriers based much of their profits on selling a certain number of expensive full-fare coach and first class tickets to business travelers. As the Internet and email and other tech based communications methods have come to fruition in the last few years a lot of discretionary business travel has been eliminated by most corporations thus the airlines have been left struggling to change their business model in order to adapt. This in particular is what is killing United as they relied even more on expensive full-fare business travel, particularly international business travel.

The reason the LCCs [Low Cost Carriers] such as JetBlue, Airtran, and Southwest have been able to so much better than the legacies is because [1] they have much lower labor costs, [2] they have managed to successfully hedge their fuel prices, and [3] their fleets are composed of almost all brand new aircraft thus they have significantly lower maintenance costs.

Problem here is that [1] virtually every airline

Edited January 12, 2008 by Camillo Sitte

[JRS1]

Geez, I leave town for a week and all this controversy continues on, all b/c of talk of MCO's ability to become a hub. kind of reminds me of that "world class city" discussion almost 2 years ago and how that discussion rubbed people the wrong way.

As for a connector from MCO to the attractions... who the hec knows. the agency overlooking CFRAIL stated that the next study area to add to CFRAIL is an E-W line connecting Lake Nona to the west.

[Boomer136]

The number one improvement I would like to see at the airport is the placing of the TSA big beige boxes post-check in counter 'backstage' as it were. I am so tired of the dance of the bags getting in line to get them checked in then dragging them over to another line to drop them off. What is the problem?

As I travel around, I think we've got an attractive airport, and rather roomy in comparison to others. Like other places though, its the hassle of security that makes me wish I could jump on a train. At least its comforting to know that no deodorant or shampoo related hi-jacking has occured since 9/11.

[bic]

Orlando airport to spend $381M to boost main terminal's capacity

Orlando Sentinel Article

[gibby]

I'm confused. Did the international bag retrieval/processing thing not show up in the article because that work is already funded and planned (or started) or did they really decide to skip it?

[JRS1]

are these jokers starting the new terminal in 2015, or is it supposed to open by 2015? B/C the article states they are trying to squeeze 5 more years of capacity out of the existing terminal... 2008 to 2013 is 5 years, plus 2 years for construction to get to 2015?

what they are talking about in the article doesn't seem like it's that critical for the money; no new gates; 3k more parking spaces? a new lane, retacar dealio, baggage deal, and pushing ticket counters back and adding self serve machines...

I think they're trying to push a little modernization through for the existing terminal b4 the new one gets underway.

[Theflytyr]

are these jokers starting the new terminal in 2015, or is it supposed to open by 2015? B/C the article states they are trying to squeeze 5 more years of capacity out of the existing terminal... 2008 to 2013 is 5 years, plus 2 years for construction to get to 2015?

what they are talking about in the article doesn't seem like it's that critical for the money; no new gates; 3k more parking spaces? a new lane, retacar dealio, baggage deal, and pushing ticket counters back and adding self serve machines...

I think they're trying to push a little modernization through for the existing terminal b4 the new one gets underway.

Thats an very interesting point of view. I never thought of that. Personally I will be suprised if it gets built in my lifetime (I am 50). I just think there will always be something to prevent it getting built.

[Camillo Sitte]

are these jokers starting the new terminal in 2015, or is it supposed to open by 2015? B/C the article states they are trying to squeeze 5 more years of capacity out of the existing terminal... 2008 to 2013 is 5 years, plus 2 years for construction to get to 2015?

what they are talking about in the article doesn't seem like it's that critical for the money; no new gates; 3k more parking spaces? a new lane, retacar dealio, baggage deal, and pushing ticket counters back and adding self serve machines...

I think they're trying to push a little modernization through for the existing terminal b4 the new one gets underway.

They are saying: The current terminal is good as-is until 2010 [which is bull*hit] and that pending $400 million now on upgrades will boost the current terminal capacity until 2015 [more bull*hit] at which time a new terminal would be needed. Whether this new terminal would begin construction in say 2012 to be ready by 2015 or begin in 2015 to be ready by 2018 they do not say.

Edited January 18, 2008 by Camillo Sitte

[bulldogger]

blah blah blah (I am 50). blah blah blah.

[Theflytyr]

And your point is?????

[bulldogger]

And your point is?????

You obviously don't watch Saturday Night Live or you would understand the reference right away. It is Sally O'Malley played by Molly Shannon. You can search for it on YouTube if you want to get involved in late 1990's pop culture.

[Theflytyr]

You obviously don't watch Saturday Night Live or you would understand the reference right away. It is Sally O'Malley played by Molly Shannon. You can search for it on YouTube if you want to get involved in late 1990's pop culture.

Guess I am out of the loop when it comes to 90's pop culture. Loved SNL in the 80's though!! Edited January 18, 2008 by Theflytyr

[solaricfission]

Merger?

http://orlando.bizjournals.com/orlando/sto...tml?jst=b_ln_hl

[bulldogger]

Beijing Unveils Giant Terminal - this is video from yahoo news

[JRS1]

Beijing Unveils Giant Terminal - this is video from yahoo news

they say it's twice the size of Terminal 5 at Heathrow, if I'm not mistaken... so, how big is Terminal 5? nice terminal, though.

[bic]

MCO will soon be receiving charter service from Lisbon, Portugal on Saturdays from July 19 to September 25, 2008. The flight will depart Lisbon at 2:00pm and arrive in Orlando at 6:30pm.

[FLheat]

MCO will soon be receiving charter service from Lisbon, Portugal on Saturdays from July 19 to September 25, 2008. The flight will depart Lisbon at 2:00pm and arrive in Orlando at 6:30pm.

I am so there, I want to do a trip to Spain/Portugal this year...what airline?

[bic]

Not sure.

Here is the press release (in Portuguese) but they don't mention which airline will operate the flights.