Oversize Expectations for the Airbus A380

As an American I was interested enough to keep researching Airbus models on Wikipedia. I was pleasantly surprised to find that Airbus has manufacturing even in the U.S. for its airline production programs, and has even been expanding that production capacity.

I have flown on many intra-US flights on non-American planes (including Airbus, Bombardier and even Brazil's Embraer)... sometimes the market actually works!

I also read the NY Times article, and they covered quite in detail the successes and strengths of the A380 as espoused by the CEO of Emirates. Far from being a "hit piece" against the A380, the article appeared to me to be a simple-enough exposition of two major airline manufacturers taking different gambles about the future of aviation. Would this story only be accurate if it were published by Le Monde or Der Spiegel?

To return to your point, the whole point to Boeing's 787 development was to compete with "longer-range international" routes... at such a long range, in fact, that two cities could be directly connected instead of requiring the spoke-and-hub model that the A380 is optimized for. And in any event, U.S. carriers do indeed run long range international routes that would theoretically be up the A380's alley, but the problem is as you state: "you'd never fill THAT many seats" to make A380 profitable for U.S. airlines (as the NYT articles states, these airlines returned to profitability by reducing excess capacity).

Years ago going from Australia to Europe typically meant going on the "kangaroo route" [1], typically via Singapore (the Qantas/BA/Singapore connection last year was replaced with a Qantas/Emirate/Dubai alliance). If you flew to continental Europe you often ended up flying to London and catching a local flight.

I visited the US in the 90s and ended up using US Air for a bunch of domestic flights. Primarily this was because at the time you could buy, as a foreigner, a number of flight coupons (that worked out to be about $50 each after 3 or so) that were redeemable for a single one-way flight (within a 3 month window).

US Air was (and is) pretty much the last holdout of the "hub" airline model in the US. I recall catching all those flights with layovers through Charlotte or Pittsburgh (or was it Philadelphia?).

The article is right that many passengers including myself prefer direct flights but there is some variability here. For example, I can fly NYC to SFO for as little as $260 coach return in non-peak periods. More typically it's $500-600. I can fly "First class" (it's not really that but it's a bigger seat with more legroom at least) on AA for $1100 via ORD or DFW. That's actually worth it at times. This compares favourably with the $4000+ AA charges for business on the new A321Ts.

Also, why do people prefer direct flights? It is at least in part due to the horrible experience and security theater that is modern air travel.

The A321T rollout is an example of what the article is talking about with reducing capacity too. Once complete, AA will end up with less transcon seat capacity.

But now there are not many places on the planet I can't get to from a major airport that require more than one layover. Hell, I can get from NYC to Perth, Australia (almost the complete other side of the planet) with one stop in Dubai, Doha or Hong Kong, possibly Tokyo and/or Seoul too.

I remember the fanfare the A380 came with 7-10 years ago and the competition with Boeing with what I think was the 747-400X? It was a concept that Boeing lost out on and was scrapped. They dodged a bullet on that one.

These days it's hard not to be on a Boeing 777-300ER (sometimes called 77W) for any serious long haul flights.

The article makes no mention of this but I MUCH prefer wide body planes (2 aisles not 1) as it gives you a chance of getting a center aisle seat where no one has to clamber over you to get to the bathroom. Ugh.

Anyway, this also evokes such boondoggles as the LA-SF "high speed" rail, which looks to be costing $30B, will take 15+ years to build, isn't that fast and is designed to solve a problem that isn't really a problem. The so-called problem is seat capacity between these two cities. It seems like the market is capable of solving this problem with bigger planes no one (currently) wants and prioritizing particular routes.

[1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kangaroo_Route

If you were to leave from Miami, there are a couple of non-stops available, using either a 767 or 787. But the rest would have things like overnight layovers midway.

So I agree with you - if the demand were there, then a US carrier would lease an A-380 or four, so that they get more fares for the same fuel.

Yet it's completely irrational why there are not the same security measures taken for train passengers. A bomb on a high speed train would lead to the death of hundred of people as well. Maybe it has to do with the fact that the government openly supports the train because it's one of the key investors in its infrastructure.