What are the advantages of a via flight? What are the disadvantages?
One advantage I can think of is you can get a one-stop flight over a longer distance than the aircraft was capable of covering nonstop. I would route it in such a way that the stop was being made at an airport within my own country so passengers are being dropped and picked at the intermediary point as well. These work well if there is little competition on that route.
Another advantage is that via flights have shorter turnaround time, so some may argue they save ground time.
From a rating perspective, a one-stop (via) flight with no plane change rates better than a connecting flight. But a one-stop (via) flight has a lower rating than a non-stop one on the same route.
In the past I have operated with full loads on domestic flights with via routes, for. e.g Jeddah-Riyadh-Dammam.
One advantage I can think of is you can get a one-stop flight over a longer distance than the aircraft was not capable of covering nonstop. I would route it in such a way that the stop was being made at an airport within my own country so passengers are being dropped and picked at the intermediary point as well. These work well if there is little competition on that route.
You can do that same thing without a via flight.
Another advantage is that via flights have shorter turnaround time, so some may argue they save ground time.
From a rating perspective, a one-stop (via) flight with no plane change rates better than a connecting flight. But a one-stop (via) flight has a lower rating than a non-stop one on the same route.
In the past I have operated with full loads on domestic flights with via routes, for. e.g Jeddah-Riyadh-Dammam.
As far as I know, this is not true. It's exactly the same to schedule a via flight or two separate flights.
The 2 advantages you have are: if your company is based in a country that is part of the Yamassoukro Decision and you save a flight number ;)
I use it for "aesthetics" reasons, since I like some flights displaying on the departures tab both destinations.
Maswell, here is some more info on VIA: http://community.airlinesim.aero/topic/2974-via-flights/
Maybe someone from the team can clarify better.
Well - Nesherius is right ;)
I too learned that there is no practical difference between a via flight and two separate flights.
There is one slight thing that I'd like to propose as a change to this.
Make all via flight legs available simultaneously in ORS
Why ?
That would allow players to create meaningfull via flights. After all it is still supposed to be one flight, just with a landing enroute. Currently if I do a via flight LHR-KEF-JFK, the LHR-KEF sector becomes available about 6 hours before the KEF-JFK sector becomes available. That means that there are bookings on the LHR-KEF sector before the KEF-JFK sector can be booked, and as a result there are less seats available for the whole LHR-JFK flight which is the purpose of the flight.
Now if the LHR-KEF-JFK became available all at once, when LHR (or it's feed in Europe) books it would see the whole journey available and book all the way instead of 20% of seats to KEF.
sk, what do you think ?
I too learned that there is no practical difference between a via flight and two separate flights.
There is one slight thing that I'd like to propose as a change to this.
Make all via flight legs available simultaneously in ORS
Why ?
That would allow players to create meaningfull via flights. After all it is still supposed to be one flight, just with a landing enroute. Currently if I do a via flight LHR-KEF-JFK, the LHR-KEF sector becomes available about 6 hours before the KEF-JFK sector becomes available. That means that there are bookings on the LHR-KEF sector before the KEF-JFK sector can be booked, and as a result there are less seats available for the whole LHR-JFK flight which is the purpose of the flight.
Now if the LHR-KEF-JFK became available all at once, when LHR (or it's feed in Europe) books it would see the whole journey available and book all the way instead of 20% of seats to KEF.
sk, what do you think ?
I like this suggestion :D
Well, it does book at the same time. All the passengers originating at one airport (in this case LHR) book at the same time. Some will book on that VIA flight to JFK, others will book to KEF. This is just the same as real airlines and airports, as anyone who has had a VIA flight can attest. You take off from LHR, and land at KEF. Some people get off, some people get on. The flight takes off from KEF and goes to JFK.
I don't think there's a way in AS to tell passengers, "No, you cannot fly on my airplane from LHR to KEF, even though it stops there. You must fly all the way to JFK on this flight. Sorry."
Addendum: What I think would be a good idea, possibly, is to make it so VIA flights don't suffer any kind of "connection drop" in the ORS rating, or at least make it so the difference is smaller. There's a definite difference in making a pit-stop landing and not having to leave the plane and having to leave the plane (sometimes go through baggage claim and different terminals) and get onto another plane, sometimes with another airline. That'd make VIA flights a lot more interesting to use and add another layer into planning and strategy.
Well, it does book at the same time. All the passengers originating at one airport (in this case LHR) book at the same time. Some will book on that VIA flight to JFK, others will book to KEF. This is just the same as real airlines and airports, as anyone who has had a VIA flight can attest. You take off from LHR, and land at KEF. Some people get off, some people get on. The flight takes off from KEF and goes to JFK.
I don't think it does. There is a lot more demand from LHR (and it's feed) to JFK than there is from LHR (and it's feed) to KEF.
The calculation times also effect the equation.
It really isn't a matter of demand, unless you mean the demand on the servers. If you are wanting VIA flights to book from both airports at the same time, you'd be creating all kinds of havoc. If I had VIA flights from my hub, through 5 different airports, to 10 different final destinations, that would create (I think) 12 different calculations just for by hub when it runs it's demand calculation. Now imagine up to 1200 airlines doing the same thing, and the calculations are happening every few seconds...
The only other way, I suppose, would be to invent a whole new demand calculation system that wouldn't tax the servers so much.
On one server I saw once a player flying with a lot of 737-900ER HGW WL from TPE via DYR to any US or Canadian Airport. Since mostly nobody wants to leave at Anadyr the passengers will stay in the aircraft.
That would allow players to create meaningfull via flights. After all it is still supposed to be one flight, just with a landing enroute. Currently if I do a via flight LHR-KEF-JFK, the LHR-KEF sector becomes available about 6 hours before the KEF-JFK sector becomes available. That means that there are bookings on the LHR-KEF sector before the KEF-JFK sector can be booked, and as a result there are less seats available for the whole LHR-JFK flight which is the purpose of the flight.
Now if the LHR-KEF-JFK became available all at once, when LHR (or it's feed in Europe) books it would see the whole journey available and book all the way instead of 20% of seats to KEF.
That was everytime in this case. So instead of KEF i would suggest you stop at Kangerlussuaq (SFJ/BGSF). This airport has less demand and not many people would leave the aircraft. It would be even possible SFJ <-> LAX/BOG.
So, If my airline is based in TLL, and I fly TLL-RVN-KTT as a via flight, would I get passengers from KTT to TLL and RVN or only TLL? and the other way from TLL to RVN and RVN to KTT or only from TLL?
So, If my airline is based in TLL, and I fly TLL-RVN-KTT as a via flight, would I get passengers from KTT to TLL and RVN or only TLL? and the other way from TLL to RVN and RVN to KTT or only from TLL?
As Estonia and Finland are covered by the EU Treaty, you’d get bookings for both KTT-RVN and RVN-TLL, as well as KTT-RVN-TLL, because you have passenger rights over KTT-RVN and RVN-TLL. However, if you were flying TLL-LED-DME as an Estonian airline, any passengers destined for DME must board in TLL because you don’t have traffic rights for LED-DME. Because LED is a fairly popular destination, you run the risk that all your passengers will disembark in LED, leaving an empty aircraft to continue onwards to DME.
Important thing to bear in mind that via flight takes you 1 out of 2 connections available for the whole connecting pax journey.
So you will mainly have O/D pax. You will not be able to make 2 connections.
For example:
O - Origin Point
C - Destination Hub and onward connection point (interlining)
H - Your Hub
D - Final destination on beyond interlining point
V - Connection point of Via flight
your via flight is
H->V->C
in this case, you only have one connection left, so possible connection pax combinations to take that flight are:
O->H->V->C where H, V are 2 allowed connection points
-------OR--------
H->V->C->D
So you are limiting to either take YOUR connecting pax via your hub into a point where via flight ends, or taking pax form your HUB and taking them to point where via flight ends and continue journey on interline partner.
If you have direct flight, you can take YOUR connecting pax, transfer them to overseas point, and hand them over to interlining partner.
If you do not do much interlining, and carry mainly your own traffic, via flights might work.
If you depend substantially or heavily on interlining, via flights are really not a good idea.
As Estonia and Finland are covered by the EU Treaty, you'd get bookings for both KTT-RVN and RVN-TLL, as well as KTT-RVN-TLL, because you have passenger rights over KTT-RVN and RVN-TLL. However, if you were flying TLL-LED-DME as an Estonian airline, any passengers destined for DME must board in TLL because you don't have traffic rights for LED-DME. Because LED is a fairly popular destination, you run the risk that all your passengers will disembark in LED, leaving an empty aircraft to continue onwards to DME.
Thanks, good to know, I originally wanted to make a small hub in RVN, but as people can't make transfers there, now It seems I must use via flights to serve the smaller airports as feeder ones to RVN-TLL route.
With via flight, one can even have one flight number for one aircraft. A -> B -> C -> D -> A everyday.
If I understand correctly, If I would start flights to US/Canada via Greenland from my EU home country I would get bookings for Hub-Greenland and Hub-US/Canada, but not Greenland-US/Canada. And will passengers from connecting flights to my hub will be able to book a flight to US/Canada?
Your connecting pax will be able to book your via flight to US/Canada, but remember that only 2 transfers are possible, and via flight counts as one of those transfer. So your passengers will be able to do only one more transfer, at either origination or destination point (e.g. into an interline in USA and Canada if originating form your hub, or transferring through your hub but terminating at route end's point).
I have question about VIA flight
Airline is from USA, Honolulu is USA, so VIA stop is in USA
If I fly from ONT(Lax) to Singapore VIA Honolulu what happens then?
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Doesn't matter if it's a via flight - and won't make a difference. You got traffic rights for HNL-SIN anyway.