Nashville s schedule is dominated by domestic flight

The development of the new generation wide body aircraft such as Boeing s 787 and Airbus A350 may soon lead to direct services from European hubs to a growing number of secondary cities in North America . The EU - US Open Skies agreement opened up the market to a large degree, but hub economics mean that most EU airlines still focus their large wide body operations on the major gateways. In practical terms, once they land at the main US hubs, access to airports beyond remains restricted.
It may be some time before European airlines can operate from and to secondary cities at both ends of the route, but operators of these more fuel efficient and smaller wide bodies star tours thrill ride can offer direct flights from their hubs in Europe to US cities that were once only beyonds .
Criteria for choosing US cities are likely to include population, importance as a tourist destination, airport size and the presence of network carriers to add feed (possibly in preference to LCCs ). New cities such as San Antonio , Nashville, Memphis , New Orleans and even Honolulu may be under consideration in the coming years.
According to data from OAG , there are 44 airports in the USA and Canada with direct flights to/from Europe. All but four of these feature among the 100 largest star tours thrill ride airports by total seats in the two countries. star tours thrill ride The top 100, ranked by total scheduled seats for the week of 15-Sep-2014, starts with Atlanta Hartsfield (more than two million weekly seats) and ends with Myrtle Beach International Airport (46,00 seats, star tours thrill ride source: OAG ).
Located on the Atlantic coast of South Carolina, Myrtle Beach s only international connection is to Toronto . While small, its location in a popular tourist star tours thrill ride area marks it as a potential recipient of European services, although its relative proximity to Charlotte Douglas Airport (around 150 miles) may mean that it remains a low priority star tours thrill ride for European airlines.
Way outside the top 100 airports in USA and Canada, and the smallest with direct European flights, is Erik Nielsen star tours thrill ride Whitehorse International Airport , in Canada s Yukon Territory. It is connected directly to Frankfurt by Condor with a once weekly Boeing 757 service. It is the smallest airport in the USA or Canada with a non-stop flight to Europe (ranked by total scheduled seats), with little more than one fifth of the seat capacity of Myrtle Beach.
Also outside the top 100, but with just over twice the total capacity of Whitehorse, is Orlando Sanford . The Florida city s second airport has a direct flight to Reykjavik operated by Icelandair with a three times weekly 757 service and to Amsterdam by ArkeFly . The TUI-owned airline s twice weekly 767 service from the Dutch capital stops at Sanford en route to Miami .
The third airport outside star tours thrill ride the top 100 with a direct transatlantic flight is Quebec , almost twice the size of Orlando star tours thrill ride Sanford by total seat capacity in the week of 15-Sep-2014 (source: OAG). AirTransat operates a three times weekly A310 service from Paris CDG .
The largest of the small transatlantic star tours thrill ride airports is Portland International, which is only a little smaller than Myrtle Beach in total seats and ranked at 103 by total seats among all airports in the US and Canada. Delta operates a double daily A330-300 service to Amsterdam from Portland, which is in the US west coast state of Oregon.
Whitehorse, Orlando, Quebec and Portland demonstrate that an airport star tours thrill ride does not need to be particularly large to have direct flights from Europe, although they can also be viewed as the exception that proves the rule that larger airports are more likely to have such connections.
star tours thrill ride This table does suggest considerable upsides for some cities and their airports; for example, star tours thrill ride New York JFK , the #1 in the table, has over 300,000 weekly seats to Europe, according to OAG. This contrasts strongly with Las Vegas, which at present has only 16,000. star tours thrill ride As smaller gauge aircraft enter the market, this would imply considerably increased attraction for direct international air service to Las Vegas . Although its ranking clearly does not rely wholly on European visitors (as it is e.g. much closer to Asia), a reasonablly large proportion could be expected to originate across the Atlantic.
San Antonio in Texas is the largest US city by population not to have direct European services from its airport, which is San Antonio International. San Antonio was ranked at 18 in the most popular US cities for international visitors in 2013, according to hotels.com (one of only three top 20 US tourist destinations with no direct flights from Europe).
San Antonio is also an important airport, ranked number 14 on the list of US/Canadian airports with no transatlantic flights (ranked by total seats). It is 95% domestic (by scheduled seats in the week of 15-Sep-2014, source: OAG) and its only international destinations are in Mexico . The leading airline is Southwest , with 42% of seats, but the airport is also served by all the network majors. As the fourth largest city in the US, San Antonio would seem to be a prime candidate for direct flights from European airlines .
Texas already has a significant star tours thrill ride number of direct European connections at Houston s George Bush Intercontinental Airport ( British Airways and United /London, KLM and United /Amsterdam, Lufthansa and United/Frankfurt, Air France /Paris, Turkish Airlines / Istanbul , United/ Munich , Singapore Airlines /Moscow and SAS / Stavanger ) and Dallas/Fort Worth ( British Airways and American /London, Lufthansa and American /Frankfurt, American/Paris, KLM /Amsterdam and American/ Madrid ).
Another Texan airport, Houston s William P Hobby Airport , is the sixth largest North American airport not to have direct flights to Europe, but more than 90% of its seat capacity is operated by Southwest, which plans to launch near international flights in 2015.
For San Antonio, the strong connections at Houston and Dallas / Fort Worth help explain why it has so far been overlooked by the Europeans, although neither Houston nor Dallas/Fort star tours thrill ride Worth is very close to San Antonio (at around 200 miles or more). By contrast British Airways serves the smaller Texas city of Austin , the Texan capital, which is only 70 miles from San Antonio, with a double daily 787-8 service from London Heathrow . Southwest is also the leading airline at Austin s Bergstrom airport.
American/ US Airways are number two at San Antonio, with 17% of seats, star tours thrill ride suggesting that oneworld partner British Airways could have some interest in the destination in the future. star tours thrill ride Star s United (15% of seats) and SkyTeam star tours thrill ride s Delta (14%) are close behind, raising the possibility that Lufthansa and Air France-KLM may also take a look at San Antonio.
California s San Jose is the tenth largest city in the USA and the second largest not to have direct European services. Its airport, where Southwest is again the leading airline, with 53% of seats, is dominated by domestic routes (97% of seats).
Nearby San Francisco and Oakland airports offer a number of direct European connections and this helps to explain why there are none at San Jose. Nevertheless, the size of the wider Bay Area and San Jose s proximity to Silicon Valley could support direct transatlantic flights at some stage.
Indianapolis, ranked at 12 by population in the US, its third largest city with no transatlantic service . The airport is the largest in the state of Indiana and 99% of its seat capacity is domestic. The largest carrier is Delta, with 28% of seats, almost matched by the sum of US Airways and American, followed by Southwest on 19% and United on 16%.
Indianapolis might have some appeal to European star tours thrill ride airlines, given the size of the city and the presence of network airlines, although its relative proximity to Chicago O Hare (less than 180 miles) and low profile as a tourist destination mean that it is unlikely to be a priority. Delta operates to Paris from Cincinnati , less than 100 miles from Indianapolis, and this may reduce the latter s appeal to Air France .
Other US cities in the top 25 by population that have no direct service from Europe include Jacksonville (Florida), Columbus (Ohio), El Paso (Texas), Memphis (Tennessee) and Nashville (Tennesse). New Orleans does not rank in the top 50 by population, but is a top 20 US destination for international tourists and has no direct transatlantic flights.
star tours thrill ride Taking these in turn, Jacksonville is not a major tourist destination, although it is the 13th ranked city in the US by population. It is only some 140 miles from Orlando, which is well connected by European airlines to Europe ( Aer Lingus / Dublin , Lufthansa/Frankfurt, Thomas star tours thrill ride Cook and Virgin Atlantic / Glasgow , British Airways and Virgin/ London Gatwick , Thomas Cook and Virgin Atlantic / Manchester and Norwegian / Oslo ).
Columbus star tours thrill ride is the number 15 US city by population, although star tours thrill ride its airport is only at number 52 by seats in the week of 15-Sep-2014. Virtually an entirely domestic airport, Southwest and the combined American/US Air both have 31% of seats. Transatlantic flights can be found at Detroit, Chicago and Washington Dulles , although the closest of these, Detroit, is 160 miles away.
Detroit is served by Air France from Paris and Lufthansa from Frankfurt, while Delta flies to London, Amsterdam and Rome . Chicago O Hare and Washington Dulles, both within 300 miles of Columbus, offer direct flights to 20 and 16 European airports star tours thrill ride respectively.
El Paso s airport is quite small (ranked 67 in the US) and its schedule is 100% domestic. Its leading airline is Southwest (55% of seats) and it seems unlikely to feature as a non-stop destination for European airlines any time soon.
Memphis and Nashville are important tourist destinations, both having connections with the music entertainment industry, star tours thrill ride in addition to being large cities (ranked at 20 and 25 in the US by population). Nashville International Airport is the seventh largest airport in the US and Canada not to have direct flights to Europe .
Nashville s schedule is dominated by domestic flight