Does Time Of Day Affect Passenger Numbers?

[DaRealWAZY]

So am just wondering if times affect passengers numbers on flights, like in the real world flight that are run from late night and early morning are not as busy as say flights run during the day and was wondering if this game simulates that. Just curious more than anything really doesn't really affect me if it doesn't but I like useless information 

[Flyguy85]

Yes it does. Big drop from 2300 till 0500.

[Zobelle]

Yes it does. Big drop from 2300 till 0500.

Seems to be more like 0000-0455, personally.

[LotusAirways]

Peak period: 06:00 - 22:55
Shoulder period: 05:00 - 5:55 and 23:00 to 23:55
Off-peak period: 00:00 - 04:55

Hope this helps.

[DaRealWAZY]

So I have in a test world of BW 2 (Literally just trying silly things and will more than likely go bankrupt only cause I was bored and ordered 1 silly b747 for a long haul route for fun)

In that I have a lot of embraer's that are pretty much run around the clock, is it better to keep them flying the early morning routes 6 days a week or to park them at that time? Like can those routes make profit at all or not really?

[Zobelle]

It keeps the plane working which if you're leasing is a good thing, but it won't make money if it breaks even at all.

[gazzz0x2z]

It keeps the plane working which if you're leasing is a good thing, but it won't make money if it breaks even at all.

The trap is : in beginner's world, it's actually making money(I mentored enough beginners to know that). So beginners take their bad habits to real game worlds, and get cut in sheesh-kebab there. And they don't listen to their mentor's advice(the reason I'm writing tutorials now - at least, someone will read them, even if I never know who it will be).

[paddk989]

the reason I'm writing tutorials now - at least, someone will read them, even if I never know who it will be).

I suspect there is a silent majority that read your forum posts Gazzz, and also the posts made by other knowledgeable players. For certain, the credit in me being able to be managing a 200 plane airline, with a 27% profit ratio, in Game World 2, is due to your forum posts and associates.

[freshmore]

The trap is : in beginner's world, it's actually making money(I mentored enough beginners to know that). So beginners take their bad habits to real game worlds, and get cut in sheesh-kebab there. And they don't listen to their mentor's advice(the reason I'm writing tutorials now - at least, someone will read them, even if I never know who it will be).

The biggest skill with this game is not actually anything to do with the game.

It's being able to admit you mistakes, listen to others and come back having learnt from them.

[gazzz0x2z]

It's being able to admit you mistakes, listen to others and come back having learnt from them.

I wish I could upvote one million times. I mean, I'm currently second in GW3 in terms of pretax profit, the ultimate measurement of success. Still, I made quite a lot of strategic blunders in that game, I know quite a few of them, I probably missed a few others. And I know also when I am lucky : I had no strong opponent in CDG(a TOP 5 airport) for the first years of the game. That's a huge advantage. With less strategic blunders, I could have ended up first. Still, I dare to think it's an excellent performance - after all, 9 companies BK'd in CDG, and my last opponent is a newcomer. I did learn from my mistakes In each game.

• In my first GW3, I did lease 2 20 years old IL62M, for transatlantic flights from Glasgow. 5-pilots very large aircraft. I had 92 very large pilots for 2 150-seaters. And it was my fourth fleet group. Canned them after 2 months of unmitigated disaster, and more than 20M$ of losses, which was probably 2 months of monthly income.
• In my second GW3 missed the 600 airplanes outside of HQ limit. Invested a lot in a big base in Warsaw. Landed 30 airplanes there, and was blocked. And also, opened plenty of large bases for flying less than five large aircraft, and mostly medium and small ones. Still a success, I covered 609 airports in this game, but I could have planned better.
• In my Third GW3, I went A148. It suited my strategy very well. 6 months after the switch, JFK gets free, and I open there. And in fact, Ejets would have been muuuuuuuch better than A148, that were more fit for my smaller dimension in Kansas City or Memphis. And I never made the effort of replacing the A148. They served me well, but I had the financial firepower to get better airframes. A148 shine if you're broke.
• In current GW3, I landed in Warsaw that was an untakable fortress. Lost my growth momentum there. I badly underestimated one of the two guys there. 20 years later, he's still kicking my ass.
• In current GW2, I ditched my wayfarers way too fast, slowering my growth. And a few other ones.

All those mistakes make me a better player than I was. There is always room to grow.

[freshmore]

I've made tonnes, but I still enjoy it when I fail or misjudge something. My current main aim in GW2 is to bring my analysis of my airline up to a new level by building spreadsheets for this a future gameworlds so I can better analyse and see problems as they develop and take action as soon as it's flagged. I've been meaning to do something like this for years and I don't know why I didn't do it sooner.

All those mistakes make me a better player than I was. There is always room to grow.

So true.

So I have in a test world of BW 2 (Literally just trying silly things and will more than likely go bankrupt only cause I was bored and ordered 1 silly b747 for a long haul route for fun)

In that I have a lot of embraer's that are pretty much run around the clock, is it better to keep them flying the early morning routes 6 days a week or to park them at that time? Like can those routes make profit at all or not really?

If you have set them up on 7 day schedules like I normally do for as 90% of my aircraft, it's better to keep them flying overnight during that time. It's a pain to find the suitable routes to do that but worth it. I try and avoid landings and departures between 0000-0500 but sometimes that just doesn't happen, but as long as they are kept to the minimum I don't see the problem. With that I've got some Heron's running 21+hours per day average. Make sure they are used as much as possible, 14-16 hours I aim for as a bare minimum utilisation for individual aircraft and 16-17 hours average is a very achievable average target.

[Cardinal]

You also learn a lot when faced with ridiculous curfews. I'm talking about the airports that are open less than 12 hours a day. The two countries I've played in where the curfews are the most ridiculous are Mexico and Japan. In these situations you learn quickly how far you can push flights to/from the few 24HR airports available to keep your planes flying more than a few hours a day.

For example, I've learned that no matter how much F demand there is, first-class passengers hate departing or arriving between 1-4am, and C passengers will generally shun middle-of-the-night departures but some are willing to show up if all the daytime flights have full C cabins. But on a shorthaul route with over 30000 demand, a B739 will fill up the Y cabin at 2:30am.

[DannyWilliams]

I find that as long as your flight starts no earlier than 05:25 you generally get full flights, same goes for flights up to 23:25 for me.

This was tested on routes with around 150 demand and 3 airlines flying 50-70 seaters...

[gazzz0x2z]

now that I recall about it, pricing is essential in this zone. I had an insane number of MAX9 covering the JFK-Buffallo route. And everything was at 95%LF. Bar the earlier starters. Though, by adapting pricing correctly(360$ instead of 440$, something like that) for the leg that was flying in less-than-ideal-timing, all legs were at 95%.

[DaRealWAZY]

Ok so a question is if say your next possible start flight is after 0:00 do you just park your plane till like 5ish or take it on a little journey to return later on ( I mean for like crj's)

What I did was this weird 7 day 7 plane schedule where the biggest gap between flights other than maintenance was the turnaround for ~1% and rushed a little of the other flights turnaround to get it to take off before 11 (23:00) and return after 05:00 really good utilization of time but perfect schedules are impossible to create

This the best and only time I managed to create a decent schedule. These are DC 8's in GW 2 flying from abu dubai


Compared to this schedule (It is 7 planes but not a schedule doing a 7 day 7 plane schedule each plane flies the same schedule each day the base airport is sydney which has a curfew but still the white space is to much to bare) but I will maybe redo my 737's max although not really caring to much since it is BW 1 with low to no competition on most routes and I am pretty free to just be lazy on the scheduling side

[freshmore]

I would do it, as long as it's an exception and not the rule. I have a few flights taking off between 0000-0100 in GW2 and a few arriving between 0400-0500. It's not perfect but it's better than waiting till morning to put the aircraft back in the air, unless you do the maintenance in that period. It can also be needed because sometimes getting it back up in the air first thing in the morning isn't possible because there are no slots with which to to do that.

[knobbygb]

I find the pax. MUCH more sensitive to take-off time than landing time. If I'm really forced to have an out-of-hours movement, to fill the schedule, I make it a landing. 3am? 4am? - it seems to make very little difference over lading at 05:30.  I haven't done any kind of remotely controlled experiment to back this up though. 

By the way, in GW1 I have around 1000 aircraft, a couple of hundred of them being < 80 seat turboprops (notoriously bad for utilisation statistics as they all operate 4 or 5 daily flights with all those extra turnarounds) and I have virtually NO departures in the middle of the night and still manage a 17.2hr average utilisation. It CAN be done!  My only 00:00 to 04:00 departures are on ultra-high demand routes where running a 737 every 30 minutes for the whole of the 24 hours is the only way to come close to meeting demand with a narrowbody. On those routes it's all about frustrating the opponent, not actually about making each flight profitable (but they all are!)

[Tha_Ape]

Another advantage of flights with bad departure/arrival times:
Unless both are in the middle of the night (0000 - 0455), one of the leg will obviously be quite lazy, but the other one can have a perfect departure/arrival. Quite useful for airports where daily slots are tight or inexistent.
And one perfect leg could be enough to make the route really profitable (never wonderful, but still).
Either to grab some unsupplied demand, or to hurt your competitors. And while you'd otherwise have a grounded plane.

[DannyWilliams]

On those routes it's all about frustrating the opponent, not actually about making each flight profitable (but they all are!)

As long as the route is green your good!

[groundbum2]

sometimes I'll fly a plane out away from my hub on a waste of space overnight flight with rubbish occupancy, just so it's sat there and ready for the primo 0600 departure back to my hub. If you get an 0600 departure it's often 100% as all the pent up demand comes online at that point it seems...

Simon