Focus city
In the
airline industry, a
focus city is a location that is not a
hub, but from which the airline has flights to at least several destinations other than its hubs. For example,
Northwest Airlines had focus city operations at both
Milwaukee and
Indianapolis, where Northwest served 22 non-hub destinations from Indianapolis (which made 25 total destinations, however, some of these are only served seasonally), while Northwest served 11 non-hub destinations from Milwaukee (which made 14 total destinations, and again some are only seasonal). As of
November 2005, Northwest has begun the process of pulling down its Milwaukee focus operations.
The term focus "city" is somewhat of a misnomer, since it generally refers to an airport rather than a city. For example,
US Airways has focus city operations at
LaGuardia Airport in
New York City, but not at the two other major airports for the New York City region:
John F. Kennedy International Airport in
Queens or
Newark Liberty International Airport in
Newark, New Jersey.
Focus cities are also used in the low-cost airline business. Airlines such as
jetBlue Airways and
AirTran Airways have focus cities in various markets. For AirTran, a city such as
Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport would be a hub, since it has over 130 daily departures, but an airport such as
Akron-Canton Regional Airport has AirTran flights to 5 cities, which would make it one of its focus cities.
*
Map of US Airways's routes and indicator of their focus cities
