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Old 12-02-2019, 03:17 PM
 
Location: Washington, DC area
11,108 posts, read 23,709,235 times
Reputation: 6417

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Traveling Mike View Post
But again I”m not saying KCs airport isn’t bad. It clearly is, but I think it’s a reach to say they should be where Denver or DC is. I mean given their location they are likely to be a much bigger hub location. Despite KC being in the middle of the country. If KC still had Midwest express and Midwest airlines this conversation would be very different. It’s just frustrating when those criticize the KCI of today when 20 and 30 years ago the air landscape was so different. Now a new airport comes in and all some want to do in far off places is complain that it’s not big enough not enough service ect.
I agree, but I also think you can look at Denver and Salt Lake City and wonder if KC couldn't have a major airport today if some different decisions were made over the years. Denver's market was not all that different than KC's 20-30 years ago and SLC is probably smaller. KC had just as good a chance to be a primary middle of the country hub as those cities. The city just did not have a proper terminal.

Having said that, when I said could be Denver now, I'm mostly just talking about Southwest. Back when Southwest wanted to make KC a focus city, they were not even flying to Denver. Southwest now has well over 200 flights a day in Denver and they plan to increase to 300 flights a day.

KCI has around 70-80 per day. So just looking at missing the chance to be a Southwest focus city alone is a pretty big deal. Imagine MCI with 200-250 Southwest flights a day and how many more non stop flights KC would have. Southwest pull away from making KCI a "focus city" bases on the terminal alone. Nobody would connect in KC and it would have been a PR nightmare for Southwest for the customers that did.
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Old 12-02-2019, 05:35 PM
 
142 posts, read 113,717 times
Reputation: 161
Quote:
Originally Posted by kcmo View Post
I agree, but I also think you can look at Denver and Salt Lake City and wonder if KC couldn't have a major airport today if some different decisions were made over the years. Denver's market was not all that different than KC's 20-30 years ago and SLC is probably smaller. KC had just as good a chance to be a primary middle of the country hub as those cities. The city just did not have a proper terminal.

Having said that, when I said could be Denver now, I'm mostly just talking about Southwest. Back when Southwest wanted to make KC a focus city, they were not even flying to Denver. Southwest now has well over 200 flights a day in Denver and they plan to increase to 300 flights a day.

KCI has around 70-80 per day. So just looking at missing the chance to be a Southwest focus city alone is a pretty big deal. Imagine MCI with 200-250 Southwest flights a day and how many more non stop flights KC would have. Southwest pull away from making KCI a "focus city" bases on the terminal alone. Nobody would connect in KC and it would have been a PR nightmare for Southwest for the customers that did.
You make a good point on SLC there. Totally forgot they were a delta hub.
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Old 12-04-2019, 03:41 PM
 
Location: Tippecanoe County, Indiana
26,375 posts, read 46,238,636 times
Reputation: 19455
Implement this at the new KCI terminal

https://www.aviationpros.com/gse/pus...ilt-in-ardmore
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Old 12-13-2019, 06:51 PM
 
639 posts, read 756,215 times
Reputation: 453
Quote:
Originally Posted by kcmo View Post
I had talked to people in the airline industry about this during that time. I was screaming for KC to build a new terminal or Southwest is going to change their plans for KC. Sure enough, they did. Denver and St Louis pretty much took most connecting type flights that KC was going to get and KC will probably never be a major candidate again for such a large SW presence. The airline is now too established elsewhere.

KCI basically functions like a bigger version of Omaha or OKC. Nearly all flights from KC run through DEN, DFW, Chicago etc. Few flights go direct to non hubs. The new terminal is so bare bones that I don't see things changing a whole lot. The new terminal was not built for the "future" like you see most cities do with then build a brand new terminal. It's basically just better than it was before. For a city the size of KC to build a proper terminal for the next 50 years to handle 20-30 million passengers a year, which could have been very possible, a new terminal should have cost closer to 3 billion and should have been constructed in a totally new area south of the runways near Tiffany Springs Parkway exit.

What can you do. At least it will be way better. But KCI will just have 20 flights a day to real airports like DEN, which MCI could be today...
I was just on another Southwest flight from DCA, smoking with a flight attendant outside. Told her I can't wait for the new terminal and what it will bring to KC. She told me that it will be good, and that cabin crews refer to KCI as Kansas ****ty airport privately. I asked her that Southwest should probably beef up the flights and she said a "a few extra flights and maybe some nonstops added but nothing like STL, DIA, Nashville, that those cites are where Southwest is concentrating. So what I took from that was that KC was a day late, dollar short.
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Old 12-20-2019, 11:20 AM
 
Location: Peoria, AZ
975 posts, read 1,395,538 times
Reputation: 1076
Quote:
Originally Posted by lovekcmo View Post
I was just on another Southwest flight from DCA, smoking with a flight attendant outside. Told her I can't wait for the new terminal and what it will bring to KC. She told me that it will be good, and that cabin crews refer to KCI as Kansas ****ty airport privately. I asked her that Southwest should probably beef up the flights and she said a "a few extra flights and maybe some nonstops added but nothing like STL, DIA, Nashville, that those cites are where Southwest is concentrating. So what I took from that was that KC was a day late, dollar short.
Denver and St. Louis are the next closest major cities to Kansas City and Southwest has focus cities at both of them. However, one of the major differences is that at the time Southwest built its focus cities at both airports, those airports were overbuilt. Southwest's focus city in St. Louis is built on the carcass of the former TWA / American Airlines hub there (which was significantly larger than even Southwest's operation today). Similarly, Southwest's focus city in Denver was built during a time where Frontier Airlines and United Airlines (which had hubs there) was struggling financially and cutting flights leading to excess gate capacity.
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