How do large airlines manage scheduling?

Title pretty much speaks for itself. I see airlines with 2,000+ aircraft - how do they manage hub changes, wave changes, or stuff like that? Or keep everything in scheduling coordinated?

Thanks!

They don’t. Usually you try to schedule in waves as long as you can but afterwards you just schedule until you filled all the slots. You don’t change hubs or waves.

A very large excel sheet :slight_smile:

How does that Excel sheet look like? What do you calculate or plan there?

Make a lot planning before growing big. As long as it makes sense, stick to it and never change, just add on to the existing flights.

Waves become much less important as you become bigger.  You essentially have enough flights coming and going all the time that you just have one great big wave all day long.  Thus why big airlines have thousands of flights.  Waves only really matter when first starting or when first moving to a new airport.

Waves help a marginal operation become slightly profitable. 

Waves become much less important as you become bigger.  You essentially have enough flights coming and going all the time that you just have one great big wave all day long.  Thus why big airlines have thousands of flights.  Waves only really matter when first starting or when first moving to a new airport.

 

Waves help a marginal operation become slightly profitable.

I strongly disagree.

Large airlines which do not follow the hub wave pattern are very prone to AGEX changes, In a competitive situation they are likely to go bankrupt when the AGEX is below 700.

I strongly disagree.

Yes and no. I usually try to stick as much as possible to waves but it gets increasingly hard when most slots are taken up. I also have a som flights throughout the day only aimed at direct passengers to try to have the waves as much as possible for connections. That is why all my A380s fly wave routes while A320s on the same routes fly more randomly.

Yes and no. I usually try to stick as much as possible to waves but it gets increasingly hard when most slots are taken up. I also have a som flights throughout the day only aimed at direct passengers to try to have the waves as much as possible for connections. That is why all my A380s fly wave routes while A320s on the same routes fly more randomly.

If you managed to

  • either block all slots at your hub to keep competitors away from those pax

or

  • simply have no competition

then this works of course.

The importance of wave pattern diminishes when the hub reaches around 1,000 departures. Yes it is a good to have. But sometimes you are more concerned on the availability of slots. 

Yes, and when the airline becomes too large. You might lose interest in managing it. It becomes quite a tedious task to adjust price. So that some routes might be even flown at a loss.

The importance of wave pattern diminishes when the hub reaches around 1,000 departures. Yes it is a good to have. But sometimes you are more concerned on the availability of slots. 

Yes, and when the airline becomes too large. You might lose interest in managing it. It becomes quite a tedious task to adjust price. So that some routes might be even flown at a loss.

1000 departures? LOL ... had you said 4,000 or 5,000 I might agree. With 1,000 departures you are nowhere near a strong hub... on a scale of strength 1 to 10, you are on level 3, maybe. In some cities you can reach 1,000 departures flying to 3-4 destinations. That's not a hub.

1000 departures? LOL ... had you said 4,000 or 5,000 I might agree. With 1,000 departures you are nowhere near a strong hub... on a scale of strength 1 to 10, you are on level 3, maybe. In some cities you can reach 1,000 departures flying to 3-4 destinations. That's not a hub.

Frankly speaking, the manner of your reply troubles me.

I only say "diminishes". Plus, this is only a matter of opinion. Your reply sounds like that I am a newbie who knows nothing about this game and never operated a mega airline. Unfortunately this is not the case.

this is not the case.

I know it's not, Paul.

I honestly don’t see how one would judge the strength/quality of a hub by simply looking at weekly departures.

If at all I’d see this as a scale for scheduled chaos, but certainly not for the strength/quality of a hub.

The importance of wave pattern diminishes when the hub reaches around 1,000 departures. Yes it is a good to have. But sometimes you are more concerned on the availability of slots. 

Yes, and when the airline becomes too large. You might lose interest in managing it. It becomes quite a tedious task to adjust price. So that some routes might be even flown at a loss.

Agreeing to Rubio 1000 departures is nothing. With a good strategy there is no need to ever adjust prices.

Frankly speaking, the manner of your reply troubles me.

 

I only say “diminishes”. Plus, this is only a matter of opinion. Your reply sounds like that I am a newbie who knows nothing about this game and never operated a mega airline. Unfortunately this is not the case.

but rubio is right, a good hub starts with 3.000-4.000 flights, then waves are not important anymore

I honestly don't see how one would judge the strength/quality of a hub by simply looking at weekly departures.

If at all I’d see this as a scale for scheduled chaos, but certainly not for the strength/quality of a hub.

Thats the point. What makes the quality of a Hub? For me its what serves the AS pax most and makes the most profit for my company. The number of flights is simply irrelevant. One of my what i would call major quality Hub and nearly untouchable for competition and AGEX has slightly over 1000 departures so far away from the 4000 or more. 

Anyway also big airlines stick to a Hub and Spoke system at least i do it as far as practicable. Of course in-between defended waves there will be "random" traffic or a "rolling hub". But if you start to implement one wave at the beginning of the day and one at the end you nearly end up in a hub and spoke system through trough the day anyway. 

I stick to a Hub and Spoke system and i use a very simple method for that. This keeps my 2-3 small airlines manageable. :)

The catch I've found with a pure wave system is you sacrifice keeping the planes in the air to keep to the wave.  Losing a flight or two a day can seriously impact your bottom line.  And because it is nearly impossible to time match short/med haul lines it becomes increasingly difficult to stay in the wave.  If you can fill the plane then keeping it in the air is always preferable in my mind.  And adding that extra couple of flights a week may mean all the difference.

The catch I've found with a pure wave system is you sacrifice keeping the planes in the air to keep to the wave. Losing a flight or two a day can seriously impact your bottom line. And because it is nearly impossible to time match short/med haul lines it becomes increasingly difficult to stay in the wave. If you can fill the plane then keeping it in the air is always preferable in my mind. And adding that extra couple of flights a week may mean all the difference.

My strategy for hubs is having 4 per day. There are usually two 7 hour waves and two shorter 5 hour waves. I agree that I some what loose flights but it’s not that bad as for shorter routes I have many off wave flights. Considering over 50% of my passenger are connecting it would have been much worse without hubs. Thereby I can justify the cost of losing a bit of aircraft efficiency.