As others have said, Australia is a very different market and their city geography is very different than here. Especially compared to the ease of travel between YYZ/YOW/YUL. Driving cars or taking the train are more reasonable between these cities, flights exist but are by no means the most popular way to travel. Melbourne is quite far by car to the other major cities, so flying is much more common. The drive from MEL to SYD is over 8 and a half hours. Much more similar in length to YVR-YYC than YYZ-YUL (not sure if it's as intense as having to drive from YVR to YYC, which is exclusively mountains. But definitely far enough to favour plane travel. If you want to be wowed, do a Google Flights search from MEL-SYD, it is insane. I chose a random Monday in July, and counted 86 flights EACH WAY. And they aren't turboprops or regional jets, they are all mainline jets (737, A320, A321). So we're talking a lot of capacity, and incredibly high frequency. Interesting that the gameplay for every carrier on the route (QF, VA, JQ, and ZL) is the same: high frequency is most important obviously, as all carriers operate almost identical aircraft and capacity, and focus on # of flights. Case in point: on that Monday I picked, there is only one widebody flight, a single QF A330. I expected there to be several wide bodies, even with that frequency. Airlines like Air Canada have been moving to a lower frequency, larger aircraft strategy. AC definitely has lower frequency on almost all of their major domestic routes, compared to 10 years ago. Across most routes, frequency is lower or stagnant from before. But that's because the aircraft used have grown in capacity, so the routes have grown overall. This is true at Jazz as well. They went from using 18, 37, or 50 seat planes to almost everything either 76 or 78 seats. That's a massive jump in seats per plane, so of course it has meant frequency cuts on regional routes. Air Canada would rather put a bigger plane on a route than increase frequency). With that said, I have a weird airport OCD that I can't explain, it's just a weird thing I have. I get annoyed when and AC route is all mainline but with like one or two Jazz flights. For some reason it annoys me when it is 95% mainline, and then one or a couple Jazz flights. Keep it all Jazz or all mainline lol. Examples include YVR-YYC, YVR-YEG, YYZ-YUL. Almost all mainline except for one or two, gahhhh, just make them 100% mainline! YUL-YQB is the worst, it has Jazz, mainline, and Rouge ooofff why?!?! Years ago, AC had 16+ daily flights on the route, compared to 4-5 nowadays. But it used to be all DH1 and DH3, so way smaller than a mainline 737, rouge 319, or Jazz DH4. I'm sure a lot of frequent fliers or business people miss the rapid frequency of yesteryear, and aren't thrilled about only 4-5 flights a day. YVR-YYJ is a similar story, but not as dramatic. Went from ~15 daily to ~8 now, and still Jazz, but all on 78-pax planes, rather than 37 or 50. So not a massive difference in offering. Plus there's so many options between Vancouver and Victoria like sea planes, helicopters, and regional airlines like WS Encore or Pacific Coastal.
But still, the trend is obvious, AC is more than willing to sacrifice frequency for larger planes. On YUL-YYZ this summer, frequency looks to be around 15-16 daily. Equipment is also variable depending on the day; some days have no widebody service, sometimes twice, and most commonly, once daily. It is the onward portion of MXP-YUL, since they axed the non-stop MXP-YYZ, and is an A330 aircraft. But it is formally a continuation of MXP-YYZ, and note a route in its own right. AC used to also have a thru flight # GVA-YUL-YYZ that was on a widebody as well, but that appears to be gone, and replaced with the standard connecting between one international flight segment and a unique domestic flight. Same as they did with SYD-YVR-YYZ.
Prev
Linear Mode
