What is the "hub-and-spoke" airport system?

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Polymath

It's a way of organizing an airline system to get the most amount of people from place to place, and keeping costs low without making it too inconvenient to passengers. A "hub" is the center of a wagon wheel, with the "spokes" coming out from the hub to the edge of the wheel.

You may ask, "If an airline has an airport in San Diego, and one in Detroit, how come there isn't a flight straight from San Diego to Detroit?" This is because few people fly straight from San Diego to Detroit. However, more people fly from San Diego to Chicago, so you fly from San Diego to Chicago, and then another plane to Detroit (or Minneapolis, or Pittsburgh, or smaller cities in that region). That Chicago to Detroit line will be shared with people from all over the nation going to Detroit, rather than just one city.

The "hub" (Chicago) sends travelers to a number of "spokes" (the smaller cities). The airline doesn't have to fly a near-empty plane from one part of the nation to another. They fly lots of people to the hub, and then smaller planes to take more people to the "spokes". The traveler benefits - they have more ways, more times to get to Detroit, rather than just one rare flight.

BonesofaTeacher

there is a central city.
everyone flies in from outlying cities
to the central city
then switch planes and fly to the outlying city that is their destination.

for example if the hub (central point) is atlanta....
then planes fly to atlanta from houston, grand rapids, kansas city, st louis, miami, jacksonville, charlotte, baltimore, oklahoma city, albuquerque, etc. all those people aren't going to atlanta.
so they switch planes and all the planes fly back to the cities.
everybody gets where they need to go. it's more efficient than
trying to fly between every pair of cities all the time. not that many people need to fly from aimes to abilene. but there will be a planeful from abilene going to different places and a plane full in aimes going to different places.

different airlines have their hubs at different places.
dfw is a hub.
love is a hub for southwest
ohare is a hub
atlanta is a hub
hartzfield/jackson is a hub
salt lake city is a hub (for delta i think)

hub airports are big and very busy because
everyone is switching planes.

Debbie

"The Spoke-hub distribution paradigm (also known as a hub and spoke model) derives its name from a bicycle wheel, which consists of a number of spokes extending outward from a central hub. In the abstract sense, a location is selected to be a hub, and the paths that lead from points of origin and destination are considered spokes. Because of the efficiency (and relative inflexibility) of the model, it requires that the items (or people) being distributed must be routed through a central hub before reaching their destination."

jayaraman

Hub-and-spoke system -means a system of air transportation in which local airports offer air transportation to a central airport where long-distance flights are available

An airline hub is an airport that an airline uses as a transfer point to get passengers to their intended destination. It is part of a hub and spoke model, where travelers moving between airports not served by direct flights change planes en route to their destination.

Some airlines may use only a single hub, while other airlines use multiple hubs. Hubs are used for both passenger flights as well as cargo flights.

Many airlines also utilize focus cities, which function much the same as hubs, but with fewer flights. Airlines may also use secondary hubs, a non-technical term for large focus cities. Examples include British Airways at Manchester International Airport and US Airways at Pittsburgh International Airport.

Some of the major airlines' most significant hubs are known as fortress hubs; such airports are typically dominated by a single airline, which can fly upwards of 70 percent of a fortress hub airport's traffic. Examples include Northwest Airlines' (NW) hub in Minneapolis-Saint Paul International Airport, Delta Air Lines' (DL) hub in Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport and American Airlines' (AA) hub in Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport. Some observers argue that the existence of such hubs can stifle competition; ProAir's battle with Northwest when it briefly flew out of Detroit City Airport is often cited as an example. Northwest was able to outcompete the short-lived discount carrier by matching its fares and offering more frequent flights.

math_prof

The answers that relate to multiple cities are correct.

The hubs are (usually) large airports that have significantly larger numbers of flights in and out. Usually they are international airports. Each airline had its own hubs, some of which are common to two or more airlines. Newark, NJ, Chicago, IL and St Louis, MO are examples of Hubs. Louisville, KY, Allentown, PA and Buffalo are spokes. It is possible, and somewhat common, for an airport to be a Hub for one airline and a spoke for another.

The point is that I can more effectively manage traffic and my fleet if I use some central locations to funnel traffic through. Plus when sending people to some of my spokes, I can use smaller, less costly aircraft, sometimes referred to as commuter jets.

Incidentally just about every airline and package delivery company, as well as railroads and bus companies claim to have invented this system, by one name or another. A similar system was used in the old west with the pony express.

pknutson_sws

A hub is the large airport that most flights will fly in an out of, or where most flights originate and end. A spoke is the secondary point - the most popupar airport flown to from the hub.

tiuliucci

Airlines use central airports to fill planes. Rather than flying from one smaller city to another, the planes fly into larger airports from small cities and then fly to the next small city. That reduces the number of empty seats.

There is a good example in my source list below.

Take care,
Troy

Wayne A

The hub is the airport that an airline routes most of it's flights through in a given region. .

Northwest, for example. . routes many of it's flights through Minneapolis and many through Detroit, so they are NWA's "hubs"

The spokes are smaller regional airports. . like if Minneapolis is a hub, then you'd fly through there to get to Great Falls, Montana, which would have a much smaller airport, and the line from Minneapolis to GF Montana would be a "spoke". . sticking out from the hub to the smaller airport (at the other end of the spoke).

chuck h

hub are large metro airports and the spokes are your smaller airports which connect.

sima p

The hud and spoke system is something major airlines use in order to create an efficiency in their services. There's a main hub...where the aircraft can stop to refuel....and the spokes are airports surrounding the hub. For example...some of the major airlines have detroit or chicago as hubs cause its centrally located and therefore refuelling can be done easily.

david42

A hub is a center distribution point for an airline. These are major cities that passengers picked up at a small city fly to and make their connecting flight to their destination. Some major hub cities are Houston, Dallas, LA, Chicago and New York. See the article below for a better explanation and happy flying.

lowflyer1

The hub is the major airport that the larger airlines fly out of.
The spokes are the smaller feeder airports that typically commuter lines work

Majenta

Noun 1. hub-and-spoke system - a system of air transportation in which local airports offer air transportation to a central airport where long-distance flights are available
hub-and-spoke
air transportation system - a transportation system for moving passengers or goods by air

Hub and Spoke Airport Networks and State Airport Infrastructure Spillovers: A Spatial Econometrics Approach
Jeffrey P. Cohen, University of Hartford
Catherine J. Morrison Paul, University of California, Davis

Download the Paper (1.3 MB, PDF file) - December 1, 2001 Tell a colleague about it.
Printing Tips: Select 'print as image' in the Acrobat print dialog if you have trouble printing.

ABSTRACT:
In recent years, many hubs in the highly interdependent U.S. air transport network have become congested, leading to delays for business travelers and freight shipments. Recent events in this industry may have temporarily reduced this congestion, but contributed to other types of disruptions. Since delays and disruptions at one node of the network exacerbate problems throughout the system, airport infrastructure expansion to enhance traffic flows and security in large hubs may confer substantive spillover benefits in the form of travel-time savings and reliability. This may in turn translate into increased worker productivity and shipping efficiency, and thus lower costs, for manufacturing firms. In this paper we evaluate the impacts of such spillovers, by applying spatial econometrics techniques to a cost function framework, using state-level data on airport and highway infrastructure, and manufacturing production. We find that increasing own-state airport infrastructure tends to generate cost-saving benefits for the state's manufacturing industry, primarily due to non-production labor- and materials-savings. However, airport expansion in connected hubs has an even greater impact, implying an important externality component of such investment. Also, unless airport expansion is accompanied by highway infrastructure investment, congestion seems to counteract the associated benefits, especially in large-hub states with less than 5 percent of the nation's passenger enplanements.

SUGGESTED CITATION:
Jeffrey P. Cohen and Catherine J. Morrison Paul, "Hub and Spoke Airport Networks and State Airport Infrastructure Spillovers: A Spatial Econometrics Approach" (December 1, 2001). Department of Agricultural & Resource Economics, UCD. ARE Working Papers. Paper 01-011.
http://repositories.cdlib.org/are/arewp/01-011

Atheist Eye Candy

Hey nice!!!!! your question is the featured question for the day. Kool.

misschichette

This system, whereby flights are routed to a central point then sent out to other cities, was introduced by Delta Airlines in 1955.

fatsausage

Debbie is correct.
This is very obvious - why do you guys have such a problem with it?
Many major airlines use this system.

Man.With.A.Plan

A central main terminal for a specific airline that all flights go into and out of. Delta uses Atlanta, for example. On Delta, you cannot fly from Raleigh, NC to Knoxville, TN. You have to go to Atlanta from Raleigh, then to Knoxville, and vice versa for the return flight. It saves the airlines a bit of hassle, but instead of a 45 minute flight you spend many hours waiting at the hub for a flight to your final destination.

CA guy

It's a sistem that airlines use to reduce operating costs.

Instead of having half full planes flying from point A to point B, they gather all the flights they can at one place and then send pasangers to their destinations from there.

It helps fill up planes, the more passangers on a plane the lesser costs per flight.

Pey

Being or relating to a system of routing air traffic in which a major airport serves as a central point for coordinating flights to and from other airports.
A good example of a hub-and-spoke system is that of Delta Airlines, which has its hub at Hartsfield Atlanta International Airport. Let's say you are in Charleston, SC, and want to go to Memphis, TN. There's probably not a lot of demand for a Charleston-to-Memphis flight, so the airline flies you from Charleston to Atlanta, and then from Atlanta to Memphis via a connecting flight.

VOOL

The hub is the main building and the spokes are the buildings/walkways/terminals coming off of it.

volleyball0993

http://www.agecon.ucdavis.edu/ARELibrary/WP/01-011.pdf

Chatty

The hub is the main building and the spokes are the buildings/walkways/terminals coming off of it.

igi

buy a ticket at the hub and get a spoke if you have no money like me

Jer$ey Girl

The Spoke-hub distribution paradigm (also known as a hub and spoke model) derives its name from a bicycle wheel, which consists of a number of spokes extending outward from a central hub. In the abstract sense, a location is selected to be a hub, and the paths that lead from points of origin and destination are considered spokes. Because of the efficiency (and relative inflexibility) of the model, it requires that the items (or people) being distributed must be routed through a central hub before reaching their destination.

Three industries that make use of this model are transport, telecommunication and freight.

FedEx founder Fred Smith pioneered the hub and spoke model for overnight package delivery in the mid-1970s. Smith established his company's hub at Memphis International Airport (Memphis, Tennessee). Soon after, other firms like UPS and Airborne had no choice but to develop their own hub and spoke model given the natural superiority of this system for speedy delivery of packages. In addition to FedEx, Delta Air Lines pioneered the hub and spoke system in the passenger transportation industry at its hub in Atlanta, Georgia to compete with Eastern Air Lines.

Hub and spoke industrial district
The "hub and spoke" has also been used in economic geography theory to classify a particular type of industrial district. Ann Markusen, an economic geographer, theorised about industrial districts where a number of key firms and/or industrial facilities act as a hub with associated suppliers and firms spread out across the economic landscape like the spokes of a wheel. The chief characteristic of such hub-and-spoke industrial districts is the domination of one or more large firms, in usually one sector, surrounded by smaller associated stakeholders. Examples of cities with such estates include Seattle with Boeing and Toyota City with Toyota.

[edit] References
Babcock, B. A., 2002, Making Sense of Cities: A Geographical Survey, London: Arnold, pp. 63â€“94.
Markusen, A., 1996, "Sticky Places in Slippery Space: A Typology of Industrial Districts", in Economic Geography, 72: 293â€“313.
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