Originally Posted by ContinentalFan
And herein lies why Continental should serve two, not just one, destination in the US!
Cycling the equipment to two destinations makes sense. The aircraft could shuttle between Asian and European destinations, to maximize aircraft utilization. I don't know if IAH is necessarily the perfect hub for such a plan, but it has worked for LGW, CDG and AMS.
The EWR-HKG route is kind of an unique case. All other flights: EWR-NRT/PEK/DEL and IAH-NRT come back to the US right away, requiring just over "one" 777 on each route.
But EWR-HKG has the longest flight time. In order to get the feed from other cities, the earliest it can depart is around noon, like EWR-PEK. That would get into HKG around 5pm. A 7pm departure at HKG will arrive EWR very late in the evening, and people can't connect to their final destinations.
That's why NW & UA all overnight their planes in HKG or other SE Asian airports. It's just the name of the game.
Having another US mainland-HKG flight is not going to help. IAH->HKG will take even longer than EWR->HKG, and the return flight will have similar time.
It's sad that while the HKG route is filled up to the gills right now, with the cheapest summer fares at like $1,700 (and no consolidator fares I can find), they still won't bump the frequency up from 6/week to daily.
Now, if Boeing had gone ahead with the sonic-cruiser, and CO had bought them, then it may be different. But that's another story for another time.