Airport traffic

I think I mentioned a few years ago I flew to Houston from MEX on a regional jet with Aeromexico. Now, the ay have flights using bigger planes, and Interjet does fly an A320 on that route. But the point is regionals are used on non-regional routes.

Also, MEX-IAH traditionally has used small planes. Back in the 70s we flew there rather often, and it was always a DC-9 or a 727. The only exceptions were 747 via Pan Am and AF, which made stops in Houston before going on to Europe.

One popular operator of that route was Texas International. Later it got absorbed into Continental and thence into United. They still fly MEX-IAH on small planes.

Early research suggest modern aircraft do have a data recorder independent of the FDR, though it shares some systems, which is regularly accessed by the airlines for purposes of maintenance, and possibly monitoring flight habits of cockpit crews.

Quote: Nareed

Again, not possible. Aeromexico, the 800 lb gorilla, and Interjet both use regional jets. Add their total market shares and tell me if the new airport won't accommodate them. Maybe in 20 years, but not now. besides, the old airport will close. So where would flights to Zacatecas, SLP, Oaxaca and such low-demand destinations leave from? Toluca? No doubt the Mexico State government would love it, but there's still the transportation issue.

Perhaps it is my imagination that the Mexican government will wield more control than the US government. I checked the domestic flights at LAX over the last month of available data and the average number of seats per flight was 128 (on average 25 seats were empty). Only 10% of the passengers came on a flight with more than 200 seats. About 14% of the flights had 50 or fewer seats.

Some airports couldn't even function without severe controls. Washington's Reagan National for one, but they can play the security card sometimes (no widebodies, no long range flights so never a lot of fuel, etc.). Also Laguardia in New York City has slot control. There is no incentive to fly smaller jets.

Quote: Pacomartin

Perhaps it is my imagination that the Mexican government will wield more control than the US government.

The Federal government owns the airport in Mexico City. They can decree whatever they want.

Frequencies are only part of the problem at MEX. More important is having only two runways, which can't even operate simultaneously. Toa very large degree, small jets are used for routes with low demand, not just to increase frequencies. High demand routes are all the relatively big A-320 and B-737. If you banned the regional jets, then airlines would drop routes and /or frequencies to Bajio, Zacatecas, Oaxaca, etc. It won't happen until air travel grows some more.

Quote: Nareed

To a very large degree, small jets are used for routes with low demand, not just to increase frequencies. High demand routes are all the relatively big A-320 and B-737. If you banned the regional jets, then airlines would drop routes and /or frequencies to Bajio, Zacatecas, Oaxaca, etc. It won't happen until air travel grows some more.

I'm not saying there wouldn't be sacrifices, but if the entire airport starts getting bogged down in delays, the federal government may have to do something. The sct lists 348 domestic city pairs with air routes, but half the passengers fly the top 13. Out of those top 13 only two do not involve MEX airport.


1 MEXICO CANCUN
2 MEXICO MONTERREY
3 MEXICO GUADALAJARA
4 MEXICO TIJUANA
5 MEXICO MERIDA
6 GUADALAJARA TIJUANA
7 MEXICO VILLAHERMOSA
8 MEXICO TUXTLA GUTIERREZ
9 MONTERREY CANCUN
10 MEXICO PUERTO VALLARTA
11 MEXICO HERMOSILLO
12 MEXICO CHIHUAHUA
13 MEXICO VERACRUZ


Internationally the top 9 routes are to the USA followed by
10 MEXICO BOGOTA
11 MEXICO MADRID
12 TORONTO CANCUN
13 PANAMA CANCUN

Quote: Pacomartin

I'm not saying there wouldn't be sacrifices, but if the entire airport starts getting bogged down in delays, the federal government may have to do something.

That's already happened, and the "something" is building a new airport. This has taken an inordinately long time, and one stop-gap measure (T2 at MEX).

As I understand stage 1 of the new place will have at least two runways, spaced far enough apart to allow simultaneous take offs and landings. Hopefully by stage two there will be four runways allowing for simultaneous landings and take offs per pair. That will clear up a lot of the traffic bottleneck we now have, where a plane taking off on 05L must wait for the plane on approach to 05R to land and roll to a stop.

BTW according to Patrick Smith's blog, both take offs and landings at MEX are longer than average due to the altitude. That makes Toluca even "worse." It's too bad JATO rockets were never applied to the civilian market...

Quote: Nareed

That's already happened, and the "something" is building a new airport. This has taken an inordinately long time, and one stop-gap measure (T2 at MEX).

I meant if the airport takes too long to build. The airport is climbing into uncharted territory. It is about 4 million behind London Gatwick which has only one runway, so GTW and MEX are pushing landing intervals to the max.

2014
38,105,747 London Gatwick Airport Increase 7.5%
34,255,739 Benito Juárez International Airport Increase 8.6%
18,756,997 San Diego Airport (busiest single runway airport in the USA)

Quote: Nareed

As I understand stage 1 of the new place will have at least two runways, spaced far enough apart to allow simultaneous take offs and landings. Hopefully by stage two there will be four runways allowing for simultaneous landings and take offs per pair.

Every new airport is planning for a huge number of runways, but you can do a lot with two widely spaced runways. DFW has 7 runways, and Ohare has 8 runways.

A lot of people forget that Heathrow, the world's third busiest airport with 73.4 MAP last year only has two runways, but they are 4600' apart. San Diego now says it cannot handle over 28 MAP on it's single runway even with billions of dollars in new terminals. It used to be 23-26 MAP.

Beijing Capital International Airport #2 in the world has three runways
Tokyo Haneda Airport, #4 in the world has four runways
Los Angeles International Airport #5 in the world also has four runways

Quote: Pacomartin

I meant if the airport takes too long to build.

"If"? Everything takes longer and costs more. Of course it will take too long to build.

But they won't ban regional jets in the foreseeable future. I'm sure Mexico State would love it if they did, because all that traffic would have nowhere to go but Toluca. It still won't happen.

Quote:

Every new airport is planning for a huge number of runways, but you can do a lot with two widely spaced runways. DFW has 7 runways, and Ohare has 8 runways.

4 would seem to be the limit of what can be handled, though I suppose 8 with 4 in perpendicular orientation can accommodate shifting cross-winds.

Quote: Nareed

"If"? Everything takes longer and costs more. Of course it will take too long to build.

But they won't ban regional jets in the foreseeable future. I'm sure Mexico State would love it if they did, because all that traffic would have nowhere to go but Toluca. It still won't happen.



4 would seem to be the limit of what can be handled, though I suppose 8 with 4 in perpendicular orientation can accommodate shifting cross-winds.

DFW has 5 parallel runway and 2 for crosswinds

Chicago is revamping it's runways. Over 80% of it's flights use just 3 runways


Mexico City is planning for six runways

Speaking of traffic, I ran across a neat app called Flight Radar 24. It tracks, and shows, flights all over the world. I may pay for the "premium" version for the Android app (if it's not a monthly subscription). The tracking map is also available online at a website (google Flightradar24).

You can, for instance, see how many regional jets land at MEX.

More interestingly is to zoom out and see the plane icons over North America. It's amazing hos much traffic there is in the US and Canada as compared to Mexico.

Playing a bit with the free version I've found lots of neat things, like cargo planes, private planes, and government executive planes. I don't think it tracks military planes at all.

I do want to find out how the app keeps track. I'm guessing ATC and transponders, but it also shows flights over water. These are not visible to ATC at all times, unlike flights over land or near land.