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I Could Not Guess The Busiest Air Route in the World. Could You?
BoardingArea

New York to Washington? London to Frankfurt? Hong Kong to Tokyo? Atlanta to Orlando? Singapore to Shanghai? Sydney to Auckland?

When I read the headline to this article The world’s busiest air route? You’ll never guess as written by Oliver Smith — who is the digital travel editor of The Telegraph — I thought at first that it would be considered another example of click bait.

I Could Not Guess The Busiest Air Route in the World. Could You?

I was not even close with my guesses.

Before I reveal the answer, I will give you one hint: of the top ten busiest air routes in the world, only one is not wholly within Asia.

Nothing yet?

How about if I give you nine of the top ten business air routes — and their respective capacities one way — without revealing the answer?

?
Sapporo New Chitose – Tokyo Haneda 6,209,366
Fukuoka – Tokyo Haneda 5,961,277
Melbourne – Sydney Kingsford Smith 5,067,167
Taipei Taiwan Taoyuan International – Hong Kong International 4,146,547
Delhi – Mumbai 4,143,639
Ho Chi Minh City – Hanoi 4,141,322
Beijing Capital International – Shanghai Hongqiao International 3,962,081
Surabaya – Jakarta Soekarno-Hatta 3,849,866
Tokyo Haneda – Okinawa Naha 3,784,546
Still have no clue?

“The correct answer will surprise you”, Smith wrote. “The most in-demand flight on Earth is actually the 280-mile hop from Seoul Gimpo International (stop sniggering) to Jeju International. More than 11 million journeys were made between the two South Korean airports in 2015, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) reports, and with a one-way capacity of 6,561,314 for 2016, according to aviation number crunchers OAG, that figure could yet rise to 13m this year.

Taipei - Hong Kong is number 3 in June and I heard number 1 last month but can’t locate official data.

I think it used to be the busiest briefly aroumd 2018, greatly hurt by covid, but recovering quite fast, HKie love TW too much, TW folks less so with HK nowadays.

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It used to be ridiculously busy. Flights flying from Taoyuan every 20 or so minutes from all the different airlines

Billions of dollars of Taiwanese business is in the Pearl River Delta area and direct flights are expensive and only a recent thing. If you are going to Dongguan(where most Taiwanese will be) then it makes sense to fly into HK. So not a surprise really

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I was a great user of that route until I moved here (until actually COVID…), was taking return flights HKGTPE every 3 weeks to come and visit who is now my wife, tried all the airlines and most time slots. So many flights with wide bodies, and yet, THEY WERE ALL FULL! Before COVID no LCC was flying that route, it was an oligopoly among BR, CI, CX and HX. Now HK express and that shite of GBA (Great Bay Airlines or whatever it is) also flies. Funny enough Starlux and Tiger air still fly instead to cheaper Macau (flew a few time from MFM instead of HKG on, Tiger air, Air Macau and even Eva air. They even advertise a transfer ferry service, but I tried several times to enjoy that service but no one knew what I was talking about, so always had to clear immigration and customs to enter Macau and then again to leave and enter HK to get back home).

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My livelihood relies on booking a hell of a lot of Melbourne-Sydney flights :sweat_smile::sweat_smile:

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well, that’s a long stretch by car, and even longer by train I guess.

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There’s only 1 train a day, it’s about 70 years old and takes 9 hours :sweat_smile: it’s faster to drive

That’s why it’s a busy route. There’s been talk of a high speed train forever but neither city has the population to support it

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blimey, not a rail country for sure haha

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Sydney and Melbourne dont have the population to support a hsr, seems there is the need if so many planes

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It’s the cost. It would take too long to repay the amount it costs to be built. Or nust excuses for politicians not to do it

The rail is fine within (the big) states, just not between them :joy:

during Covid we saw how Oz states really behaved more like separate countries then entities within a unified (albeit federal) nation.

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It’s always like that but covid made it more obvious. Especially with WA always threatening to leave :sweat_smile:

Most legislative power lies with the states, the commonwealth can only legislate on topics specifically mentioned in the constitution. Anything not mentioned is left to the states. It was by design because none of the former colonies would have unified if it meant giving up independence. It’s different for the territories

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I thought they were talking about upgrading the existing track to speed trains up between Syd and Melb. Not Taiwan speed HSR, but 5 or 6 hours, might be okay.

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It still astonishes me that rich countries such as Australia cannot begin to imagine a high speed rail link between these two large and growing cities. The US and Canada are the same, extremely backwards in this way.

Guy

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I’ve read the magic cut off point for people to take it is three hours or so. If it’s significantly longer it’s harder to get ridership.

Guy

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Yeah just in terms of climate change it makes sense. The HS1 between London and Paris was carbon neutral in 10 years and cut out a huge number of flights between the UK and mainland Europe.

The fact that UK has taken decades to build one more domestic line and now people are talking about scrapping it puts me in despair. And now people are talking about scrapping it

Some of those routes in the US, like LA to San Francisco are such no brainers. The costs are just out of control because of all the interest groups and consultants ratcheting up the costs.

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yes and no, it all also depends on the dependability of the air transport: in Italy the longest full HSR ride is from Turin to Salerno, the express service takes a little over 7 hours. It’s always full since the only reliable means to get there, flights are scarce and likely delayed.

Also easier to get frequent trains than frequent flights.

Then u need to factor in the time to get to the airport, checkin, security, boarding, deboarding, baggage claim, getting to downtown from the airport.

most likely getting a train is overall faster and more convenient.

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I moved here during Covid so I didn’t know what Taiwan was like during normal times. After Covid ended, I started to hear more Cantonese than Mandarin or Taiwanese in my neighborhood. Totally caught me off guard. :sweat_smile:

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Route is busy again as a transit hub to China, most direct flights were cancelled in the last few years and only a few have been reinstated.