Continental Airlines announced their first route to use their soon to arrive 787 aircraft.  It will be from Houston to Auckland, NZ and if nothing else, this is just fun to think about.   Tentatively scheduled for November of 2011, it’s a long way off still and I would regard it as being subject to a lot of things going right such as the aircraft arriving in time. 

This is exactly why I believe aircraft such as the A380 and 747-8 have a very limited role in the future of air travel.  We now have aircraft that, in the broad scale, are medium sized but very long range capable.  The 777-200LR was the first but even that aircraft is a touch big for some routes.  Not so for the 787-8.  The 787-8 is a 767/A330 sized aircraft capable of handling longer, thinner routes that, frankly, really don’t get flown today. 

Houston to Auckland may strike many as a little weird but it really isn’t.  It puts Auckland within range of the middle of the United States with a full load and margin for safety.  Suddenly there are a whole lot of cities on the East Coast and in the Midwest that can enjoy 1 stop service to New Zealand.  Previously those people had to fly to the West Coast and, in many cases, had to make 2 stops before arriving in LA.  Even if they had to make one stop, this flight will mean less travel time “door to door” than ever experienced before. 

Houston might seem an odd gateway to Auckland but it isn’t.  Consider the hub cities the new ContiUnited will have.  You can feed traffic from NYC, Philadelphia, Washington DC, Cleveland, Chicago and Houston to that flight.  That’s probably not enough to fill a 747-800 but it’s plenty to fill a 787-8 aircraft and I suspect a lot of that traffic will tend towards a more premium customer. 

The United part of the airline will continue to handle West Coast to Australia trips.  Air New Zealand will probably keep their routes from New Zealand to the US but ContiUnited will now be the first to open up the eastern half of the US to Down Under.  That’s huge and a bit of a blow to both Delta (SkyTeam) and American Airlines (Oneworld).  This could potentially see Delta and/or AA opening up routes using the 787 to similar destinations Down Under. 

Will it happen?  I think so but it does have a certain fairy tale quality to it.  I remember Aviation.Net members discussing such fantasy routes as far back as 2005 I think and when such things get fantasized on Aviation.Net, I tend to believe they’re too good to be true.  However, I believe this has a better than 50% chance of happening because it fits well within how Continental is run, the Star Alliance network and its what a SuperLegacy network airline should be flying when it comes to long haul destinations.

Filed under: Airline News, Airline Service by ajax