The airlines serving Raleigh-Durham International Airport, including American Airlines (Nasdaq: AAL), Delta Air Lines (NYSE: DAL), and Southwest (NYSE: LUV), are hedging their stakes as the airport strengthens.
In the era of the "new normal," some of the routes that generated the greatest income before the epidemic aren't doing as well because corporate commercial flying hasn't yet caught up to where it was in 2019.
New statistics from aviation tracker OAG show that leisure routes like RDU to Orlando are winning. Business-focused markets like RDU to Boston and RDU to Atlanta are the losers.
Let's have a look at RDU's top revenue-producing routes and their value to airlines.
RDU's major routes in terms of income
Source – Shutterstock. A distant view of Terminal 2 at RDU International Airport – North Carolina, USA
Data from August 2022 to August 2019 reveals "a little churn," according to Rebecca Rowland, an analyst with OAG. She lists Atlanta as the highest revenue-generating city in RDU in August 2019. According to the most recent data from OAG, Seattle had surpassed Atlanta as the most profitable flight as of this August.
Atlanta, which was the most lucrative route in August 2019, is now placed ninth, according to Rowland.
Other RDU pillars have also lost ground. According to the data, Newark, for instance, dropped from ninth place in August 2019 to seventeenth place this year.
The top five revenue-generating strategies at RDU in August 2019 were:
- Boston,
- Atlanta,
- Denver,
- Las Vegas,
- LaGuardia.
The biggest revenue producers in August 2022 were:
- Seattle,
- Denver,
- Los Angeles,
- Las Vegas,
- Orlando.
The Seattle route's earnings increased from just under $6 million in August 2019 to almost $7.7 million in the same period of 2022. Additionally, according to OAG data, it exceeded $9.2 million in June 2022 (as opposed to less than $6.2 million in June 2019). Atlanta's revenue decreased from $7.6 million in August 2019 to less than $6.5 million in 2022, for comparison.
From Kansas City to Cancun and the Bahamas: these are the flights scheduled to depart from RDU
Source – Shutterstock. Passenger jet taxiing at RDU Airport – North Carolina, USA
According to data gathered by OAG, 12 of the top 20 routes in terms of revenue increased in profitability.
This includes JFK in New York, whose RDU route increased in value by $3.6 million (bringing in about $6.4 million in August 2022). But eight of the connections had financial losses beginning in 2019. RDU-Boston, which lost more than $3 million compared to the previous year, is at the top of the losers list.
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Source – Shutterstock. Young woman passenger walking from the airport terminal to the airplane for departure
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Source – Shutterstock. Raleigh, North Carolina, USA: Delta on final approach to RDU
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