Airlines moving away from hub approach

After three decades of the airlines hub based scheduling, major airlines are beginning to compete with low cost carriers by offering direct flights, outside their hub systems.  And, learning it can save costs for the airline and consumers.

This movement could turn out to be one of the biggest shifts in the industry since it first adopted the hub-and-spoke approach after deregulation in the late 1970’s. Already, major airlines have added 134 nonstop routes in the last year, and flights promise to be cheaper than they have been in the past, reports the New York Times.

Even with the shift, direct flights make up only 10.7 percent of domestic routes, but that proportion is up from 9.3 percent in 2003, according to Back Aviation Solutions, an industry consulting group. Still, airline executives hope this trend will lure more people onto airplanes, and if this brings in more profitable business, then airlines are likely to put on even more direct flights.

What is fueling this shift is the rivalry between the big airlines, on one hand, and the nimble and profitable low-fare airlines, like JetBlue and AirTran Airways. The latest airline to add nonhub flights is Southwest Airlines, which on Wednesday begins direct flights from Pittsburgh to four other cities, including Philadelphia, a route that until now was owned by US Airways, says NY Times.