Impact of Delta hub on Metro Detroit?

[MrNittany]

The Delta Hub is definitely a net positive for Detroit, but there are some things that are individually bad about it.

Positives:

1. Helps the economy at the local level. Many connecting [[routes like St Louis-Detroit-Portland, Maine) will buy things during their 1-hour or so layover at DTW.

2. Also helps the economy at the more-macro level. When your city is more connected and easier to get to, businesses are more likely to set up shop there, and other folk are more likely to visit.

3. The Detroit-based flyer can get to basically every Tier-1 and Tier-2 US city non-stop. You can't fly direct to the likes of San Diego, Portland OR, OKC, Memphis, Omaha, Greensboro, Charleston SC and Jacksonville from every other non-Chicago Midwest city. But you can from DTW. Very convenient for business travelers, where time is money.

4. Higher frequency as well. Non-Chicago Midwest cities have their daily non-stops to places like LA and San Francisco. But it's typically only 1-2 per day. Certainly not 6 of them. Delta from DTW does.

5. Higher availability to "second-tier airports within a huge Metro area." Every Midwest city has a flight to NYC. But it's only LGA, JFK or Newark. What if my business is actually in Westchester or Fairfield County, Connecticut? I can avoid those 3 airports and fly into White Plains. Considerably better. No other non-Chicago Midwest city connects to White Plains. Ditto for Manchester, NH [[Boston), Orange County [[LA) and Allentown [[viable for portions of North Philly or Northern NJ).

6. Every airport out there charges landing fees for every flight. DTW as a hub gets a whole lot of flights - thus, they can get a whole lot of revenue even if their "landing fee per flight" is relatively low. That helps fund large-scale airport projects.

Negatives:

1. A degree of "loyalty without a choice." If I am flying DTW-OKC and I'm time-sensitive, well, I'm very very very likely to take that direct flight. Delta faces no competition there. If I live in Cincinnati and flying to OKC - there is no direct flight. So I'm connecting somewhere. That's adds more time but it does add more options. All of AA, Delta, United and Southwest will have viable connection options, so I really have 4 choices instead of 1.

2. Per the above, Delta knows they have pricing power in the Detroit market, and they leverage that. In the aggregate, Detroit travelers will pay a premium for all those non-stops available. Passengers pay more in hub cities, that is a proven fact. Delta really took advantage of Cincinnati residents when they had a hub down there.

3. Travelers who don't like regional jets - well, hubs tend to have a fair amount of them. Primarily for the smaller cities that are part of the network. But they will also show up for bigger cities [[e.g., if Delta flies to LaGuardia 8 times a day, a regional jet may be for 1-2 of those flights. Delta may be providing that 12 Noon flight, and having that frequency is great. But they also know that some times are considerably less busy than others).

4. The bigger and busier the airport, generally the more a PITA it is to get in and out [[security, parking, rental car et cetera). Outside of the rental car situation, I think DTW fares pretty well here. But this is a thing.