Starting An Airline

That's a variation on an old aviation proverb: "How do you make a small fortune in aviation? Start with a large one."

Is the next letter of that company's name u?

Wasn't just L that happened to, N had the same issue.

I am curious why you used the mysterious L in your comment instead of referring to Lucent by name? None of what you wrote was libelous. For people not around at the time it will not be obvious who you are referring to. As a result only the "cool older kids" know who L is and it makes it hard for newcomers to learn about the history of the industry. Personally I do not think hacker news comments should be written in such a way as to reinforce boundaries and segregate "people in the know" from the unwashed masses.

For anyone interested in learning more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucent#History

I'd go for the opposite.

An exclusive airline that is basically 1st class through out the entire cabin.

* No carry-on suit cases

* Free alcohol

* Free meals on all flights

Membership required, and can be revoked by:

* Talking on your cell phone

* Not following crew member instructions

* Trying to prevent the person infront of you from reclining

* Trying to jump the line and board when your row isn't called

* Not being able to actually lift 40lbs but requesting an exit row seat anyway

* Trying to smash your carry on into an already full overhead bin

* Listening to music loudly etc.

The planes practically (can) fly themselves these days now anyway. Remove the ticket people, checking bags, food/drinks on the plane, and build a nice, efficient website for booking... Then structure your routes on flexible demand. Almost like crowdbuying tickets... There are probably a low number of people (outside business travel) that need to be somewhere at an exact time. Operate the ticket buying process like Massdrop. Let the collective decide when a plane takes off.

There's a lot of tweaks that could change the airline industry, but certainly no easy task.

The problem is that you can't actually fire anyone on board the plane. Those flight attendants aren't there to serve your drinks. They're there to guide/assist you "in the unlikely event of an emergency."

The pesky regulations say they need x attendants per passenger.

Engineers often fail to understand that sometimes the cheapest solution is to throw minimum wage workers at the problem.

Budget airlines like Allegiant [1] streamline thing to save money.

* Very few ground staff - say 4 at a small-to-mid-sized destination. They do all tasks: Ticket agent, baggage handler, gate agent.

* No connecting flights - direct only.

* All the same type of equipment (MD-80s) to streamline maintenance.

etc.

[1]

It's called Ryan Air[1]

[1] http://www.ryanair.com/

It's unlikely ever to happen, but I wish someone would start an airline that only requires pre-2001 levels of security screening[0]. I'd be interested in seeing how having some competition on security policies would affect the larger market. Would people value the sense of security that the theatre gives them, or would they prefer the less invasive measures?

Unfortunately, AFAIK, every airport in the country is required either to use TSA screening or to use private security companies whose policies are set by the TSA[1], so this is unlikely ever to happen.

[0] With the exception of ensuring that cockpit doors are always closed and locked during flight - this was the one absolutely critical security improvement that came out of 9/11.

[1] I believe SFO is one airport that uses a private company.

Ryanair already have this down to a T. You don't actually interact with any ryanair staff from the time you book your flight until you're passing through the gate. At that point you meet the cabincrew/stewards for your flight, two at the door who check your boarding pass and glance casually at your passport, and you then walk across the runway to board the plane in no particular order. Everything is an extra,you're bombarded with ads for the duration of the flight (particularly annoying on a 45minute flight where they start at takeoff and keep going until you land). You also print your own boarding pass, and are normally located as far as humanly possible from the airport terminal, in an airport nowhere near the location advertised (London Stansted, Barcelona Reus, Paris Beauvais).

But I can fly to London return for 30 euro pretty much any time of the year in return for that.

Thanks; burying as dupe.

There's a healthy market for used planes.

Allegiant is a great example. They fly slightly less fuel efficient MD-80s which can be bought at bargain prices from the legacy carriers (MD-80's are those narrow body jets with the engines in the back and the 3-2 seating arrangement). They make it work by flying nonstop flights from smaller airports (without competing carriers on those routes), with low frequency. The low frequency also gives them longer until they have to do a heavy maintenance check -- which, for an older MD-80, usually costs more than the plane is worth. http://www.fastcompany.com/1325762/heard-allegiant-air-why-i... .

This is almost completely wrong, and more about AA wanting to be able to raise prices.

Boing and Airbus are the only viable suppliers of long-range commercial aircraft, and if you order a 787 or A380 you will need to wait[1].

But it's not "locked up" so much as it takes a fair while to build, and they do have order books. But they are desperate to sell as many as they can (stories of orders being cancelled aren't uncommon).

In the short and medium range market there are a number of other suppliers. Embraer and Bombardier both have planes that sell well. For the more adventurous there are the Irkut MS-21 and Sukhoi Superjet 100 (both pretty modern, but I think only in service with Aeroflot)

As noted elsewhere, there is a large market in second hand aircraft.

[1] There is actually http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ilyushin_Il-96, but I think that has only been sold to Aeroflot and other Russian airlines. Edit: turns out the passenger version of this is now out of production.

The problem is that first class takes up much more than 15% more space per person than coach. You'll notice there are three chairs per side per row in a standard 787 coach, but only 2 first class. That's 50% more right there, plus there's more leg room so it's worse.

Their margins are already thin even packing it as they do, so at only the equivalent of 2/3 current capacity that would be a recipe for failure. They'd have to charge probably twice as much.