Haneda International Slots
The additional 30,000 annual daytime international Hanedaslots comes on top of the existing 30,000 international slots at Haneda, equating to a doubling of daytime international capacity. Background On Tokyo Haneda Expansion. For those who haven’t been keeping track, Tokyo’s busiest airport is adding 50 new daily international slots. Located about nine miles from Central Tokyo, Haneda is preferred by many travelers over Narita International Airport (which takes roughly 1 hour by rail).
American Airlines, Delta Air Lines and United Airlines have submitted bids for new slots at Tokyo’s Haneda International Airport following an agreement between US and Japanese aviation authorities earlier this year.
A total of 12 additional daytime slots are to become available to US carriers for the start of the 2020 summer season. The slots are being made available after a deal was reached to allow civilian movements through airspace controlled by the US Air Force’s Yokota Air Base.
The additional air links form part of the Japanese government’s target of attracting 40 million foreign travellers to Japan in 2020.
American Airlines
American Airlines is seeking to operate two daily flights to Haneda from Dallas/Fort Worth, one daily flight from Los Angeles International and one daily flight from Las Vegas McCarran.
The airline currently flies once daily between Haneda and Los Angeles, which began in 2016, as well as a daily service between Tokyo Narita and Los Angeles. It also operates two daily Tokyo Narita - Dallas/Fort Worth flights.
The airline added that Las Vegas is one of the largest unserved US markets for Japanese travellers. Earlier this year, the carrier tested the market by operating flights between the Nevada city and Tokyo Narita around the time of CES 2019, the world’s biggest technology show.
American’s proposed Haneda service would be operated as part of the airline’s pacific joint business with Japan Airlines. The venture was established in 2011 and covers travel among 11 countries in Asia and North America.
American Airlines’ president Robert Isom said: “Enhanced service at Haneda would give our customers better access to downtown Tokyo and open up JAL’s domestic network with flights to destinations like Osaka, Sapporo and Fukuoka.”
Delta Air Lines
Delta Air Lines wants to launch daily service between Tokyo Haneda and Seattle, Detroit, Atlanta, and Portland (Oregon), as well as twice-daily service between Haneda and Honolulu.
The carrier currently (w/c 18 Feb 2019) operates daily service from Tokyo Haneda to Minneapolis/St. Paul and Los Angeles. It serves Tokyo Narita daily from Seattle, Detroit, Atlanta and Honolulu, plus Portland five weekly.
It is unclear whether Delta would end service to Narita should its latest route applications be successful.
In a statement, the carrier said: “Together with the carrier’s existing service to Haneda from Minneapolis/St. Paul and Los Angeles, these new routes would bring Delta’s proven operational reliability and exceptional service to more customers traveling between a broad network of US cities and Tokyo’s preferred airport.
“Additionally, Delta’s proposal provides a competitive and comprehensive alternative for consumers to the service offered by other US carriers and their Japanese joint venture partners, ANA and JAL.”
United Airlines
United Airlines wants to add six daily non-stop flights to Tokyo Haneda from Newark Liberty, Chicago O'Hare, Washington Dulles, Los Angeles McCarran, Houston George Bush, and Guam's A.B. Won Pat International.
The proposed daily flights from Newark, Los Angeles and Guam would supplement the airline's existing daily flights between those hubs and Tokyo Narita, while United would shift existing daily non-stop Chicago, Washington D.C. and Houston flights from Tokyo Narita to Tokyo Haneda.
“If awarded by the DOT, these new nonstop flights would expand United's best-in-class Japan route network to better meet demand from U.S. consumers and businesses,” said United Airlines President Scott Kirby.
“Tokyo is a hub of 21st century global commerce and innovation and one of the world's most popular tourist destinations. Today's filing demonstrates United's unparalleled commitment to helping more Americans travel between our nation and Japan's capital city.”
The Haneda slot applications are in and, not surprisingly, there is contention over the six slots available to serve the Tokyo airport from the United States. In a slightly surprising move the DoT is requiring all carriers to apply anew for service, even to keep the routes they already have, and there are nine desired routes for the six available slots. Only five of the slots are available for daytime operations but all nine routes are seeking daytime operation. A few airlines are going to find themselves disappointed.
Each of the four existing routes – Honolulu on Hawaiian, San Francisco on United, Los Angeles on American and Delta – is back in the application pool; no real surprise there. And each of the four airlines is also seeking additional service. American wants to fly from its hub in DFW, United from Newark and Hawaiian wants to split frequencies between Honolulu and Kona for its second slot. Delta wants two additional slots, one for Minneapolis and the other for Atlanta. Also worth noting is that Hawaiian has listed as a third preference in its application a willingness to take the HNL/KOA flight in the night slot if that’s the only way to get the additional service.
As the only application explicitly willing to take a night slot Hawaiian might earn that second frequency, something it believes it has earned with a note on today’s earnings call that 40% of traffic between Haneda and the USA goes to Hawaii. Of course, some of that is because the other routes have been limited with night operations so it is unclear that the numbers would remain that way moving forward.
If we assume the four existing allocations are kept and converted to daytime then my bet would be on United winning with Newark for the fifth daytime slot – hard to argue a ton with connecting the NYC area with Japan – and Hawaiian gets the night slot for its split service. If the initial four are not all preserved it seems unlikely to me that the DoT would approve multiple carriers operating on the LAX route. Minneapolis seems a weak choice as a secondary hub for Delta while Atlanta has a strong position with the massive connecting flow the carrier can push.
UPDATE (10:20p 16 APR): Turns out DL put MSP as its second priority after LAX and above ATL. Could be a move to try to ensure that LAX sticks around but the prioritization of MSP over ATL makes zero sense to me from a passenger flow perspective.
Perhaps AA keeps LAX and Delta gets ATL instead of its existing LAX service. In the same way an AA swap of LAX for DFW could make sense, though the move to add that service goes against the company’s previously stated desire to expand transpacific capacity from Los Angeles.
It also appears that Delta has relaxed its initial position of demanding all the Haneda slots so as to move its Narita hub operation wholesale into the new operation. This is not particularly surprising as that was never really going to happen, but it is nice to see that the application is measured.
Haneda International Slots App
I would be very surprised in Newark doesn’t win one of the slots. Nonstop service from New York City seems a very compelling argument and United can connect a decent amount of east coast traffic as it does with the current Narita flight time. JFK was one of the original slot awards when Haneda first opened but American eventually dropped the route due to weakness attributed to the flight times. And despite both Delta and American having a strong hub presence at JFK neither of them went for the Haneda slot there.
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