Portland International Airport (PDX) News

[PhillyPDX]

Originally Posted by downtownpdx

Yeah I think Seattle is quite a bit larger than Vancouver for international flights, and Alaska and Delta both have hubs in Seattle that pdx passengers often feed into. Air Canada might still have daily to Vancouver after the Alaska flight ends.. but i suppose that doesn’t help you use points.

Yeah, my points aren't getting me to Asia.... Was more just curious to see it noted on Wikipedia. Air Canada still has the route. I'm assuming Alaska is able to send more connections through Seattle now that that airport has almost doubled in passengers in 20 years.

[Bigtimecharlie]

I’m still, and will be forever more, perplexed about the use of PDX. I get Portland is smaller than Seattle and won’t have the diversity and scope of available flights. What I don’t understand is why Portland only has one or maybe 2 non-stop flights to most destinations - typically scheduled at the worst possible times and at higher fares - with the rest requiring a stop in Seattle. Everyone say’s Seattle is over crowded and looking for different airport options -Boeing field, Everett, etc. One thing that might help is not requiring almost every flight out of Portland to connect through Seattle. I’d certainly appreciate not having to deal with a 1 to 2 hour layover in Seattle to get pretty much anywhere else in the country - particularly destinations in California. I just can’t believe the market is so weak in Portland that airlines need Seattle customers to fill flights. Very frustrating.

[uncommon.name]

Originally Posted by Bigtimecharlie

I’m still, and will be forever more, perplexed about the use of PDX. I get Portland is smaller than Seattle and won’t have the diversity and scope of available flights. What I don’t understand is why Portland only has one or maybe 2 non-stop flights to most destinations - typically scheduled at the worst possible times and at higher fares - with the rest requiring a stop in Seattle. Everyone say’s Seattle is over crowded and looking for different airport options -Boeing field, Everett, etc. One thing that might help is not requiring almost every flight out of Portland to connect through Seattle. I’d certainly appreciate not having to deal with a 1 to 2 hour layover in Seattle to get pretty much anywhere else in the country - particularly destinations in California. I just can’t believe the market is so weak in Portland that airlines need Seattle customers to fill flights. Very frustrating.

Well, if you're flying Alaska, Seattle is their hub so most flights will route through Seattle. Just like if you fly cross country with United, you're likely going to have a layover in Denver. Delta-Atlanta, etc. Airlines choose hub cities to route most of their flights through so they can send most of their regional flights to the hub to transfer passengers to planes already headed to other cities. It makes sense operationally for an airline to consolidate to a hub, but is frustrating for us travellers who just want to take a direct flight somewhere. As Portland finished up the new terminal and travellers increase, I feel we will see an increase in direct flights to other cities.