Last week, United Airlines announced that its service between Los Angeles and London Heathrow will go double daily starting next spring. Will United add any additional transatlantic routes from LAX?
Beyond London, Will United Airlines Add More Transatlantic Flights From LAX?
While American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, and United Airlines maintain hubs at LAX, the ultra-competitive nature of the airport has made some longhaul routes challenging.
For example, United launched service from Los Angeles to Singapore in 2017, but ended the service in 2018 citing weak performance. American Airlines canceled its service from LAX to Buenos Aires and São Paulo during the pandemic and has confirmed the route suspensions are permanent.
But as the appetite for transatlantic travel remains strong, might there be room for more direct service to the UK or Europe on a U.S. carrier? Recently, Delta Air Lines announced it would launch service from Los Angeles to London (LHR) and Paris (CDG). These are not new routes, but have not been operated for several years.
I asked Patrick Quayle, United’s Senior Vice President of Global Network Planning and Alliances, about the possibility of more routes from LAX. Specifically, I referenced Delta’s recently announced LAX-LHR/CDG service (LHR despite up to three daily flights on its Virgin Atlantic joint venture partner and CDG despite up to four daily flights on its Air France joint venture partner). Do your Star Alliance partners have other LAX – European routes adequately covered? What would you be looking for in trying to gauge the demand to branch beyond LHR when it comes to European transatlantic service from LAX?
Here is the response I received from United:
“We have prioritized growing LAX-LHR to two frequencies to improve schedule coverage in the largest European market from LAX. We continue to monitor demand to prioritize opportunities to further grow transatlantic service from LAX in the future, supplementing existing one-stop connections over other United hubs and our JV partner service to FRA, MUC, ZRH, and VIE.”
In 2008, United offered its own service from Los Angeles to Frankfurt for one year, but found the route unprofitable. Since then, it has not offered transatlantic service beyond London. Current Star Alliance transatlantic coverage from LAX includes:
- Austrian – Vienna (VIE)
- LOT Polish – Warsaw (WAW)
- Lufthansa – Frankfurt (FRA) + Munich (MUC)
- SAS – Copenhagen (CPH)
- SWISS – Zurich (ZRH)
- Turkish Airlines – Istanbul (IST)
Austrian, Lufthansa, and SWISS are United joint venture partners, meaning they revenue and profit share on transatlantic routes. Such a strong financial partnership lessens the need for United to offer service of its own.
The bottom line is that while Quayle is bold to try new routes and United is always studying its options, I would not expect any additional transatlantic routes from LAX for the foreseeable future.
CONCLUSION
As a Los Angeles-based flyer with family in Europe, transatlantic service is a big deal to me. While I greatly value United’s service to London and look forward to it going double daily, I still believe there is potential for other profitable routes from Los Angeles. But with joint venture and Star Alliance partners offering such extensive service, it does not appear we will see any additional routes anytime soon.
Any news on the new Terminal 9 at LAX and the ground breaking ceremony yet??
Would love an update on this as well.
Frankly this could be a game changer for United at LAX and we could see a much larger United at LAX once they have T9.
I asked. UA said no comment.
I agree with you Matthew. I think there are a handful of routes to Europe that could work on United metal and make a profit. It is a different United Airlines, and frankly a whole different travel environment, than it was in previous years. Just because a route like Frankfurt didn’t work in 2008 doesn’t mean it won’t work now. United has a much better product now.
Generally speaking though, I was wondering how you feel about United at LAX right now Matthew? Obviously the LHR going double daily is great, and Melbourne resuming next week is great, so in those senses it seems United is committed to LAX. However, they just cut Hilo a few days ago (effective in January) and a handful of regional routes are being cut in the next few months. Not to mention JFK is also being cut, although that one isn’t by choice. Do you think United is being competitive enough at LAX, or are they still surrendering to competition too much?
Not only would I like to see more international service out of LAX, but I think the domestic network needs to be grown too. There are so many cities, MIA, FLL, ATL, DFW, MSY, BNA, etc. that I wish United served from LAX. Some of those cities I just mentioned have plenty of O&D demand, the question is only if United is willing to compete with a number of other airlines. Hopefully with all the new planes coming in over the next few years we will see some of these new routes happen.
I wouldn’t count discontinuing service to Hilo against UA. Unlike most US domestic destinations, the ag forms tell the state precisely where tourists are going when they arrive. The fact that at Christmas they’re running 2 daily 737’s out of LAX to Kona, 2 777’s out of SFO and 1 777 out of DEN tells you that that side of the island is where the demand is.
Agreed! And if United ran 777s LAX-KOA, they would see an increase in service. If I need a more comfortable flight, I’m having to book LAX-HNL-LIH/OGG-KOA. I almost don’t mind the layovers because the fleet of 737s are uncomfortable, bad aging and stacked too tight.
So where do you think United could add sustainable routes to these days?
From LAX? FRA, MUC, ZRH, CDG, AMS, FCO, I think a lot of these could work.
As an LAX-based frequent flyer to Europe, I also wish we had more UA options. But I much prefer the short hop to SFO to take advantage of a longer opportunity to sleep than transferring at EWR, IAD, ORD, IAH.
SFO-CDG and SFO-ZRH have been a Godsend, and I am very much looking forward to SFO-FCO!
Do you ever take the LAX to LHR route and then connect on BA, or will you always connect in another UA hub?
I always used to connect on BA to BSL. Very easy.
How much time would you recommend? I want to get up to Inverness and really only BA makes sense for that (KLM does it from AMS too I suppose), so I’d fly to LHR on UA and then connect to BA for the INV flight. 3 hours, especially if it’s “low” season?
Yeah I think 3 hours is sufficient, I recently flew to LHR and then connected on to Rome (just because LHR is an easy upgrade on United) and it took about an hour to transfer terminal and get through security at the new terminal.
I think their best bet would be popular European routes not served direct or not served direct often (Rome, Athens, Barcelona, etc)
In other UA news, the last Dreamliner remaining with old seats is in Xiamen for Polaris retrofit
Also, the first 767-400 in Polaris is coming out of HKG tomorrow!
United just does not have many nonstop flights to Europe from ANYWHERE on the west coast. They have demonstrated they don’t really give a rats ass about west coast residents going to Europe. They expect people to suffer from 2+ stops to get to their European destination.
Idiots.
In Summer 2023 UA is running the following flights out of SFO to Europe:
London Heathrow: 3x daily 777-200ER
Frankfurt: 2x daily; 1x 777-300ER, 1x 777-200ER
Amsterdam: 1x daily 777-200ER
Munich: 1x daily 777-200ER
Paris CDG: 1x daily 777-200ER
Rome: 1x daily 777-200ER
Zürich: 1x daily 777-200ER
That’s 10 daily UA roundtrips to Europe out of SFO, on top of LH to FRA and MUC, LX to ZRH, SK to CPH, TP to LIS and TK to IST.
What more do you want from UA? SFO is their primary west coast international gateway, not LAX.
Not to be “that guy”, but the 3rd daily SFO-LHR is on a 787-9, not a 777-200
I stole the list from SimpleFlying, so… 🙂
@Bobo, United will offer service to *seven* destinations nonstop from SFO, some with multiple frequencies, in addition to the service from LAX.
What other airline offers anywhere close to that number of destinations from the west coast?
I would love to see United open up LAX to Rome route!
I honestly believe an LAX – FCO route on UA would do very well. I realize the lack of connectivity may be problematic, but just as a point-to-point route, I know it would be popular and ITA commands quite a premium on the route.
A seasonal LAX-FCO on UA would be the only route I could see happening. There is not much competition (only ITA flies it) and it could be done with a 787-8 or a -9. The rest of Europe though, is doubtful. The US3 have tried to serve Continental Europe from LAX several times before, with mixed to no success. DL’s decision to restart LHR is more about a slot at LHR than serving the LAX market. LAX-CDG also seems to be a waste of a frame, given AF’s large presence in the market. UA adding a second daily LHR flight is a good thing, but one has to weigh the price UA paid for the slot at LHR against the success of bookings for the long term.
Italy is such an iconic European destination and SO consistently underserved by UAL..I find that frustrating; Milan, Rome, Naples, Palermo!!!
Hardly underserved by UA….
In Summer 2022, they operated 2 x daily EWR-FCO, daily IAD-FCO, and daily ORD-FCO, plus daily EWR-MXP, added ORD-MXP (seasonal), EWR-VCE, EWR-NAP. They announced EWR-PMO in 2019 for Summer 2020 but it never started obviously, due to the pandemic. SFO-FCO seasonal service was announced for Spring/Summer 2023 last week. They are actually quite big to Italy.
LAX/TLV?
Maybe I’m a bit biased as a Norcal native, but I kind of think of United at LAX should be similar to AA in New York – serve the markets where they have strengths, but don’t lose money competing where they will lose. The fact that they are even as big as they are in LAX is a testament to the strength of the local market. While no one will ever be dominant in LAX, United has the least need among the US3 to lose money in the bloodbath of competition by adding routes to places where it’s not already strong since it has SFO. One of the few good decisions of the Smisek years was to reallocate resources from LAX, an airport where United will always face endless competition from DL/AA on the domestic feed end and numerous carriers on the long haul end to fully capitalize on SFO and eventually launch routes like AMS/CDG/ZRH/FCO etc. Trying to build up LAX to the wrong places could risk a doubly negative impact on profitability – in addition to losing money on a route such as LAX-CDG, where Air France already has 3x daily and greater connecting traffic potential on both ends, they could drain profitable routes such as SFO-CDG, which even saw a 777-300ER some days this summer.
I think the biggest factors enabling United’s growth at LAX today would be the 787 and markets where they are already strong, such as Heathrow, Hawai’i, Tokyo etc. We could definitely see United add routes like FRA/MUC on their own metal, but I don’t think it would be wise for them to add places like CDG/AMS/FCO.
It’s worth noting that United’s the only US airline where we can even have this conversation though – I ‘d almost go so far as to say DL/AA are essentially domestic airlines reliant on partners for any long haul feed at this point.
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They tried double daily in 2016 and promptly cancelled it, better luck this time.