jpatokal

My, that's almost as bad as Cairo to Abu Dhabi via Singapore!

Delhi to London? Beijing to Helsinki? Nairobi to Paris?

Yes, on both QF and EK.

Singapore's too far down south to be an actual Asian hub for much more than Indonesia (which is, admittedly, a large and growing market). If traveling across Asia (say, India to China) or to Asia from Europe or the US, it's simply not along the way. The reason it has its current prominence is largely because it was for a long time the only halfway sane place to stop over on the Europe-Australia long haul, but the Gulf carriers have eaten SQ's lunch here and are hungrily eying its breakfast and dinner.

On grounds of geography alone, northern Myanmar might make a pretty good place for a hub, although politics and economics make that a non-starter for the foreseeable future. For time being, Bangkok will have to do, and despite the worst efforts of its government and its inept flag carrier TG, it's doing decently.

pseudoswede

And why do they have a newly remodeled terminal?

Cloudship

Just tornadoes, which lead to new terminals, eh?

cbn42

Why are so many people thinking in terms of long-haul international flights? Just about every airline starts off flying short-haul routes, domestically or to neighboring countries. Therefore, the best place to put a hub is a large city that is not already a fortress hub for another airline.

The last two new airlines in the US followed this rule. B6 chose JFK and BOS, and VX chose SFO and LAX.

Kagehitokiri

stut, but not as a hub right?

china market is going to be huge, mainly for travel within asia

t325

Touche

They were in the process of remodeling it anyways. The tornado just sped it up.

Cloudship

So here are some more far fetched ideas.

Anchorage. Not a big city for O/D traffic, but looking globally, it makes a great midway location for traffic bound to Asia. Especially if you could figure out a way to make transit for international travelers easier.

Azores. This might make a good hub for a discount airline serving the US/South America to Europe and North Africa route. I am not sure how big an airliner they can land there, but I imagine they can at least take a A330.

Bermuda. Again for a leisure traffic oriented airline. Not only do you have strong layover opportunities, it would be a good consolidation point for the Europe to Florida routes.

St. Pierre. Right now a tiny little airport, but... not only is it right on the major routes to Europe, it also happens to be a part of the EU. If an airline were to invest in a new airport, and especially a nice new terminal. You could clear customs/immigration there and be on your way. And, since you will be the major player in the economy, you would be sure to get strong support.

BearX220

All four remind me of the idea that kicked around for years of building a new hub airport in a deserted part of the central US for the sole purpose of managing connecting traffic. No O/D volume at all -- the idea was that it would be far from populated areas to reduce congestion. This went nowhere for obvious reasons.

If you are talking about a new domestic US hub there are plenty of ex-hubs abandoned by the legacies awaiting exploitation: CVG, MEM, PIT, STL, CMH. If you are talking about a global hub you have to go to where volume traffic growth will materialize, which means southeast Asia. CGK, KUL, MNL.

It does not make sense to plop a hub in a geographically inconvenient place nobody goes. It makes less sense still to build one for the convenience of a few premium business flyers.

airplanegod

I don't know in the real world if this would happen, but if an airline wants lots of room for growth and for lots of connecting passengers, airports such as CLE, STL, MEM, CVG, PIT, MCI, and others that i'm forgetting are move-in ready with plenty of abandoned concourses/free gates.

belfordrocks

How about Kangerlussuaq? Will do wonders for the economy in Greenland as well (though I'm not sure how they'll cope during the winter)

Kagehitokiri

or iceland

tmiw

DEN seems pretty reasonable but it's a huge Southwest, Frontier and United hub that would be difficult to break into.

Another option would be to start with the lucrative transcons (LAX-JFK, etc.) and work up from there. You would need to have a hard and soft product that beats whatever's available now to have a good shot though.

Tchiowa

Because the US domestic market is saturated.

tmiw

I can see another carrier taking root at least on business-heavy routes if they can offer service better than the Big Three (even in coach). This type of flying would be predominantly point-to-point though.

bgriz18

Yep, I agree.

Look up OneJet its a new airline for point to point business travel. First 3 bases are IND, MKE, and PIT. With service timed for early morning departures and late afternoon returns. Its a very interesting airline and hope it works because so many medium and small cities have lost nonstop service and now only have flights to major hubs.