javabytes

The Connections board when you leave the aircraft seems to show you the gate no matter how far away departure is, even when the app won't. Also, the generic airport boards (like those underground by the people mover in ATL) will show you the gate info.

It is annoying to have to hunt and find this information. If I have a long layover, I'll likely want to visit a restaurant or lounge near my departure gate. Not telling me where that is only annoys me.

BigDawg23

I have gotten Gate Information 24-48 hours before on both Delta App and Fly Smart app. However, the number of times it changes the morning of is amazing. I had several 60 minutes prior to boarding changes. I am paranoid and always check once at the airport and if early check again to avoid last minute dashes.

TheMadBrewer

This is a bit of an issue at LAX as flights might leave from T5 or T6. It's not that far a walk but it is still irritating. I don't care about the gate, just the terminal and I am sure in most cases they know that.

It is humorous when the Delta App says "Terminal 5 Gate 69A" -- but not so funny to somebody who might not know that Gate 69 is T6

The consolation prize of schlepping over to T6 is you get to use the AS Board Room.

N639DL

But then again is the ATL point... I used to look at gates 3 days out when it was available on my reservation and when going through ATL I knew those gates were nowhere near final.

Awesome to hear from someone who used to do that. I see myself being a station manager but may go into gate scheduling if it seems like a good idea somewhere down the road.

I think at ATL and other major hubs it is fine to keep gate info held from flight status until 3 hours or so until departure (those will still probably get changed) but smaller stations and even moderate sized ones such as BOS that is mostly O/D anyway should be able to have more ability to announce gate info earlier.

Starblazer

Ours is populated for all day tommorrow on Flightview. If delta wants to hold it on the FlyDL app, let them

DLERT

I wonder if that man behind the curtain - Yeah! That man uses his almighty
power to control which gate will be used on any given day based on the
computerized loads of the connections that flight will generate.

I.E. flight 1234 arrives at the Atlanta fortress gate A19 on the A Concourse
(middle of the A Concourse if you know ATL)
and has connections to MCO 20 - DFW 12 - MSY 9 - MIA 8 - RDU 7 - CLT 1
So the planning is to have those heavy connections at adjacent gates on the
A Concourse and those like CLT in the example put maybe out on the end
of the B Concourse.
Ideally the least movement of the major bulk of the connecting traffic is
contained on the A and the minor stuff relegated somewhere else.
Now take all the potential traffic that could arrive with their loads and mix
this into the equation. The gates in the center of the A Concourse will get
a great deal of use and handle the bulk of the traffic - other gates further
away not so much.
*** Then the glitch - the mechanical - the late arrival due to wx - and all
of a sudden the grand scheme is tilting towards chaos and creating the
domino effect that will last to the end of the day.

So what has all got to do with Gate Assignment.
Well the loads vary day by day and do not always remain the same thus
to keep the grand scheme of concentrating the bulk of the traffic in an
easy to manage way the arrival and departure gates have to be flexible.
*** You sort of knew that all along didn't you ?
So the gates used yesterday may not be the same today or tomorrow -
but at the beginning of the day at a origin station the gates can be
generally be consistent. Then again a glitch can occur like the early
morning maintenance taking longer than planned resulting in forcing a
change of the 2nd bank of flights using that gate.
Excedrin headache number 1 for the gate controller.
Reassembling the gate picture with the least disruptions.
For the savvy frequent flyer all knowing of airport structure and the
fastest best way to go from Gate A to Gate B the gate adjustment picture
can be cleared away in a hurry. But for the one time passenger going to
Peoria - well what's a person to do - I am lost in a sea of gates !
Ideally at an origin station the flights with the highest number of passengers
should be at the first available gate with minimum distance and disruption.
But loads and traffic change daily - weekly - seasonally - the gates can not
always be the same in that event. But one would expect that the flight with
next highest load to be somewhere near where the number 1 flight yesterday
was. Not all airports are the same and not all gates can accommodate all
types of aircraft from the 747 777 down to the CRJ 7/9 but there should be
some consistency in gate use at the start of the day.

This leading back to that man behind the curtain - why wouldn't Delta want
publish the gate game plan for the next day - albeit with a notation that
gates and times can change ? Pull the curtain aside and let the traveling
public see and plan for the big picture to expedite their traveling experience !

Or is it simply a matter of Delta randomly throwing darts at the last moment
to determine which gates are used by which flights with no regard to how
the customers can help smooth the operation ?

The only way now to predict the gate usage is to monitor a week or so in
advance checking on each day the previous usage and within a couple hours
time frame for today. Tomorrows use is still hidden behind that curtain.
Come on Delta pull the curtain !

OHDL1

"Just having it up earlier when the gate is likely to not change can be helpful. At a really small station such as ALB where there are 8 departures and arrivals per day using 2 gates, no harm in having it up early since it's such a small station."

LOL...in what way?? If it ain't at one gate it's at the other!

MSPeconomist

What is DL's objective function here? Why should they care to minimize walking by connecting passengers? If you were to say that DL should try to keep gates close together for flights where passengers have tight connections or even for flights where passengers have requested wheelchair assistance, I could perhaps see that being an appropriate consideration but OTOH <just joking> to minimize fuel costs, DL should give us very long walks or runs between connections, especially for FFers, so that we'll lose weight.

PRWeezer

I was told recently that at ATL there's an attempt to keep similar aircraft on the same concourse to allow for quicker shifting of crews...but reality often gets in the way and gate changes happen. I know enough men (and women) behind the curtain to know that despite the best-laid plans, it's a new adventure every day, even for the almighty.

MSPeconomist

At some airports, certain business and elite heavy flights tend to be given closer or otherwise more attractive gates.

It's also somewhat historical in that many DCA flights exMSP have been continuing to use the same "low C" gate where the holding pen was built post 9/11 long after the DCA flights ceased to require special handling of passengers. Similarly, the ORD flights continued to often use the gates around F8 long after FastTrack (semishuttle) service was discontinued.

SDQBound

I think they are taking your suggestion into account. JFK T4 was designed to maintain a travel/health balance

HDQDD

That's very low on the priority list. Since there's still some discussion, I'll elaborate a little more on what goes into a good gate plan. Long read alert...

Descending order of priority. I've been "retired" from this for over a decade so I might miss something.

• Aircraft Type - Not every type of aircraft can go to every gate. That's probably the top priority. If you try to schedule a CRJ at a wide-body gate, you'll have issues
• Customs - If it's an Int'l arrival, it has to connect to a gate that is connected to the FIS. If one isn't available, it will either have to wait til one is, or at some hubs they can bus pax.
• Contracts with other carriers - We had a contract with two other carriers whose ground handling we did. Their contract stipulated a certain gate (because that's where all their airline specific stuff was).
• ACAA issues - If you know you have an aisle chair coming in on an RJ, you want to make sure that plane gets a gate that has a jetway (as opposed to ramp deplaining, where applicable)
• DMI/MEL items (Deferred Maintenance Items/Minimum Equipment List). For instance, if a plane has a INOP APU, you can't put them at a gate where the GPU is INOP, or there isn't a GPU. I made this mistake my first day doing a gate plan and the pilot let me have it over the radio. To be fair, it hadn't been reported as bring INOP, but alas, I always made sure to check after that.
• Ramp Manpower planning. At the hub I worked at, one ramp crew worked two adjoining gates. We had to allow a minimum of 15 minutes between those two departures to allow the crew to push one flight, then close up the other and push it. If we gave <15 (which operational necessity sometimes dictated) then if a delay occurred, it was coded to operations and not the ramp.
• Connecting crews - Crews understandably hate to switch airplanes in the middle of their trip. However, sometimes the airplane needs to end up in a different city than the crew for scheduled MX or other routing reasons. We try to make this as easy as possible for crews by keeping their next airplane close to the one they're getting off of. Obviously, as you can see above, this isn't always possible with all the other things going on.
• RON Parking - Remain OverNight airplanes. We did have a standard morning departure gate plan. I.e. LGA always went out of gate one, ORD gate 2, etc. So at night, you try to have the arrivals in the right gates to do this. As I mentioned in my last post, rarely does it work perfectly.

One thing you may think is missing from my list is pax connections. Typically that's of no concern to a gate planner. It really isn't even relevant if a flight is on-time.

Departures take priority. If you put a late arrival at a gate closer to some of its connections, you've now just caused a gate change for two flights...the one you parked at another gate, and whatever flight used to be parking there. Doesn't sound like much, but you've just caused two delays which means those flights will likely come back late and now you've got an even bigger mess. Not to mention that pax, bags, catering, fuel, cleaners, crew have to be moved between two gates (this takes a lot of time and coordination). I can't think of a scenario where you would ever do that just for connections. It would be more prudent to delay the outbound departure a few minutes if there are large group of connecting pax and no protection on later flights. But alas, these decisions are not made by gate planner, they're generally dictated by System Operations Control (another group I worked in later in life).

StayingHomeIsBetter

I'm curious as to how many people can find gate info in the DL app between T-3 and T-2, especially for ATL.

I don't believe that it is typically there.

This can be helpful info when you are still at the originating airport, connecting thru ATL, and a 45 minute delay has consumed most of your 60 minute connection time.