cslusarc

I've heard the recent chatter about NW choosing to order 15 or so Boeing 787-8s. This got me thinking of where NW would use these birds first. I'm not expecting them to arrive until the 2010-11 time frame by which time International traffic between the United States will have grown by about 25-30% above 2004 levels of 30,458,126,000 revenue passenger miles.
Between now and 2010, I'm expecting NW to only take delivery of the A332 and A333s that NW has already ordered. I believe this leaves significant room for growth.


For example :
Between the US and Asia transported 20 billion RPMs in 2004:
I believe that as both transpacific traffic and congestion at NRT growns, NW may need to remove spokes from its Tokyo operations hub. I belive that overflying the NRT hub will happen. The first destination I think this will happen to is PEK-Bejing. A DTW-PEK nonstop flight offers better connections to a majority of the population of the United States (those living in the Eastern and Central Time zones) than connecting in NRT. A SEA-PEK route in partnership with AS would capture the remainder of traffic who would find it not advantageous to connect in DTW.
With the spokes like NRT-PEK removed from the hub, I beleive that NRT could redeploy the slots to add more US to NRT frequencies such as adding new routes like BOS-NRT or LAS-NRT.
The second NRT spoke I would remove is NRT-ICN. I beleive that NW and KE could come to lauch a joint venture and increase nonstop US - South Korea frequencies.
The third NRT spoke would be PVG - Shanghai.
The fourth and fifth NRT spoke would be HKG and CAN - Hong Kong and Guangzhou.

I believe that PUS, BKK and SIN must continue to be hubbed at NRT because of the distance between the US and BKK and SIN and a lack of traffic between PUS and the US that could support double daily A332s from US: 1 each from DTW and SEA. (for this study I have considered GUM and SPN as domestic US destinations but these destinations could be flown n/s from the US mainland.)

[Edited to correct: TPE - Taipei is not served from NRT. Thanks acf573.]

civicmon

you raise some interesting points.

One thing you may be forgetting is that not everyone on those flights to/from NRT is American. What I mean is that the flights from NRT-PEK/HKG etc can also fill up with Japanese and other Asian-nationalities (mostly Korean due to geography) as well.

I don't know about the market that NW has in Japan and NE Asia for those routes and whether it's actually more cost-effective to keep their ops as it is instead of making a city like SEA a sort of NW-East Asia mini-hub, but I agree, NRT is getting a bit too crowded with 4 hubs there.

nlp

ฺSince I live in this part of the world,

KIX-BKK
2nd NRT-BKK
HNL-BKK
LAX-BKK
NRT-KMG
NRT-Vietnam

I don't think any of these is possible anyway.

tcook052

I wonder about the Pacific Rim as every major American airline made hints lately it's looking to that area to expand, including, but in no particular order, CO, UA and AA IIRC. Sir Richard Branson has his eyes on the Indian market as it's growing rapidly and LCC springing up like temples. So how 'bout NRT-DEL or NRT-BOM?

DJMeatBall

United Airlines tried a India<->Asia set of flights (before 9/11) which apparently was somewhat less than successful. If the Search feature of FT were working, you would be able to look up the history.

I'd love to see NWA finally start up the DTW <-> Madrid service they attempted to begin a couple years ago. There are one, maybe two WorldPerks (marketing) airline partners passengers can link up with from Madrid, for points beyond.

I can't imagine why NRT <-> Vietnam can't happen. Why won't it happen?

SPN Lifer

NRT or NGO to CEB.

Yaatri

Those were part of an around the world flight similar to PanAM 001 and 002, Asia-India being HKG<->DEL. I am not sure why it did not work although traffic to India was heavy then too. It could have something to do with the times. That the demand for trafic in and out of India is not fully met is shown by the fatc that the fares are still high on a per mile basis. With the open skies agreement having initialled between India and the US, expanded agreement bewteen China and India and India throwing open skies to SAARC and ASEAN members, US and Asian airlines have an opportunity to increase their share. Sixty percen of the traffic between India and the US is caried by non-US, non-Indian carriers.

There are periods when the Transatlantic travel is going through a low or a shoulder season but the traffic to India is heavy, like late Oct-Mid Nov and March. Also, with the exception of Christmas-New Year period, the ourist season to India spans the Oct-March, the traditional low season across the Atltantic. Increased coonnectivity to India would help fill in seats in the low season.

cslusarc

Civicmon: I realize that today a significant percentage of travellers on those beyond-NRT intra-Asia segments is local traffic. But that is today. I'm talking about as we near the next decade. In 2010 traffic to all over Asia from the US will grow by a healthy 25-30% (upto about 5% per annum) and by 2010 I highly doubt that NRT will add additional runway capacity, so NW will be stuck will the same number of slot pairs it has today. NW will have three choices reduce its market share, upgauge its existing US - NRT flights, or begin to de-spoke NRT and begin overflying it. A realistic solution is a combination of the later two options, thus resulting in an effect that those US - NRT segments would have more seats be taken up with passengers flying between the US and NRT.

Nip:
I believe that it would be more likely that NW would add more beyond KIX routes such as your KIX-BKK. Your suggestion for a 2nd NRT-BKK seems unrealistic as there are and will be runway constraints at NRT. HNL-BKK sounds interesting with a stagelength of 6600 mi, it would have limited demand though. LAX-BKK is pushing the limits of the 788.

cabinpressure

Agree re: DTW-Madrid. How about Dublin too? Neither would be overflying AMS, but rather stopping short of AMS. And NW keeps adding more and more Midwest spokes to the DTW hub to feed in pax (who might have otherwise taken a one-stop via ORD, but with less congestion at DTW would probably choose NW instead).

jimc_usa

MSP to Sydney, Melbourne etc

acf573

This spoke has actually already been removed. Now the only way to get to TPE on NW metal is DTW-KIX-TPE. I used to think they removed NRT-TPE due to mainland China pressure, but your post makes me think that maybe it's also due to capacity constraints at NRT. So DTW-KIX-TPE may be a sign of the future. Perhaps they will set up a secondary hub at KIX?

kyushuman

NW tried KIX as a hub--at one point in the late 90s, NW had nonstops from KIX to TPE, MNL, MSP, KUL, KHH (I think), HNL, LAX, and DTW, along with JD codeshares to FUK, NRT, etc! Now, it's just DTW, TPE, and HNL. I guess there just wasn't enough traffic. I do know that KIX has been less busy than predicted anyway, so it may not be NW's fault, just that the market can't support that many flights. Anyone have a guess?

jing_canada

NW does carry traffic from Japan to other Asian destinations. But the competition with Asian carriers is so much. Pratically, the connections within Asia through NRT are close to impossible. The connections are built for Asia<--> North America.

Recent development of tensions between Japan and other Asian countries will make transit traffic through NRT drop. Time will show by how much.

SeaMeFly

With a lot of loyalty from the Filipino community in the west-coast, I think NW should try flying non-stop LAX-MNL, SFO-MNL or even LAS-MNL eliminating the 2-3 hrs sit in KIX, NGO, or NRT. Because as of now, PAL is enjoying the monopoly on the non-stop to LAX & SFO from their hometown MNL.

kyushuman

I think you're right--NW offers 2x daily 744s to MNL (ex-NRT and NGO), and used to fly 3x (they had KIX too). Prices from the US to MNL are always sky-high--usually around $1500 even from the west coast-especially in summer.
I assume you know that NW still have that great deal in WBC ($1890+taxes RT from LAX/SFO to MNL). I've taken that the last two years, though last year it was only $1625--cheaper than the cheapest Y I could find, even.
Thanks for the cheap competition, PAL!