United Airlines will add four new international routes at San Francisco, double service to one Asian destination, and make two Pacific destinations year-around.
In a highly-anticipated press conference, United CEO Oscar Munoz announced the following new service from SFO to:
- Amsterdam (AMS) [yep, previously announced]
- Melbourne (MEL)
- New Delhi (DEL)
- Toronto (YYZ)
In addition, the carrier will double service to Seoul (ICN) and turn seasonal service to Auckland (AKL) and Tahiti (PPT) into year-around service.
Here’s the new schedule:
That’s It?
We can debate whether this news is “historic” but it does represent a serious international expansion at SFO. Let’s focus on the three new routes announced today. First, the new Toronto flight will be operated by a 737-800, making it marginally less attractive than the widebody 787 aircraft that Air Canada uses on select frequencies on the same route. This is the return of an old route, but it is nice to see it back since upgrades are easier on United than Air Canada. Furthermore, since AC and UA are joint-venture partners, the new route should feed traffic on both sides.
The Delhi flight will compete against Air India, but offer a great new connection to the Indian Subcontinent. This new service will not replace the existing service from Newark. Finally, the new Melbourne service will not come at the expense of LAX-MEL, though it will depart and arrive around the same time. Hopefully United won’t pull a Singapore on us. With United’s latest Melbourne flight, the carrier now will have five flights to Australia (SYD from LAX,SFO,IAH and MEL from LAX,SFO).
CONCLUSION
Well, one of my predictions was correct. Sort of. Am I bit disappointed? Sure. I’m not sure what makes the new “historic” as opposed to other route announcements. United already serves all of these destinations and the Amsterdam announcement is not even new. But I do not downplay the new routes or that consumers will greatly benefit from more connectivity on United.
What do you think about United’s “historic” expansion from SFO?
well so much for GUM!
These are some great routes, but honestly it all feels kind of “meh” to me. Interesting but hardly historic.
On another note, the timing on that SFO-DEL flight is downright brutal. No shot at connections in DEL, and you’re looking at getting to your hotel around 3 am. That’s gonna be a fun first day in India…
While I totally agree with your sentiment, most connections to India get you there at similar times. DEL is busiest in the middle of the night, I assume due to heat in the summer, like in the Middle East.
Nothing historic …not at all. Not even a new city pair. All of those destination are already served
Gurgaon is a pretty large tech/finance hub, so I’d expect DEL to pickup some tech traffic. The downside is that any connections within India will compete against ME3, CX, SQ, etc where UA definitely lacks on schedule and product on all of the 1-stop bay area markets.
It looks like they shook the airplane tree and had a lot of WB aircraft fall out of it.
Like the nothing burger Amazon HQ2 search foisted on us. Not historic at all but I like the Tahiti flight!
I haven’t read what you have to say just yet, but will do so after posting this. Before reading your message my thoughts are as follows: Oscar waisted his time today. That guy has bigger things to worry about, and he had no business announcing those routes. As far as I know, there is nothing about that announcement that is historic. So lame United!
I’ve read it now. I understand where United was going, but that was still lame. There really isn’t history here. I still believe Oscar waisted his time today.
Double daily ICN is a good move. Ever since they retired the 747 ICN has been severely underserved. Demand vastly exceeded capacity.
Actually 12:45 am is pretty much standard time to arrive in India even if you leave 6 hours earlier and connect in FRA/LHR etc. The traffic is better at 1am anyway, and you can get 3 hours sleep before your work day.
Yeah that “historic” announcement, especially given the pre-announcement of “historic” flights was very lame. The new routes are good, especially SFO-DEL, but there’s no need for the hype. A steady stream of new route announcements is far better.
The SFO-DEL announcement (doesn’t start until *next* December) would have been better saved to preempt or counter Delta’s (also pre-hyped future) announcement of a (single) flight to India.
I’d rather United had done another anagram teaser on Twitter.
I would like to see SFO-MUC become year-round and be rescheduled to operate later in both directions, to facilitate sleep eastbound and incoming connections westbound