What Are The World's Largest Unserved Routes? (2024)

Summary

Direct routes between major cities like LAX and JFK are limited but valuable.
Growing demand for direct flights due to expat populations not being met.
Factors like aircraft range, demand, and economic feasibility affect route availability.

While airlines continuously analyze data, looking for potential routes to open up between two city pairs, some routes still do not have enough demand to sustain direct connections. The global travel data provider OAG compiled a list of some of these routes that were not directly served by any airlines in 2022, with Simple Flying going over some of them in the following article.

However, since the report was published, airlines have begun serving some routes, including one that involves flights to the United States. At the same time, seven out of the ten routes originate or are operated to the US, including major airports such as Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), New York John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK), or San Francisco International Airport (SFO), to name a few examples.

Key findings

Other significant routes that include North America are the LAX – Yerevan Zvartnots International Airport (EVN), which serves the significant expatriate Armenian community on the West Coast of the US, and flights between Toronto Pearson International Airport (YYZ) – Tehran Imam Khomeini International Airport (IKA), with close to 82,000 passengers traveling indirectly over a 12-month period.

What Are The World's Largest Unserved Routes? (1)

Photo:NYC Russ | Shutterstock

The longest route on the list are flights between Ho Chi Minh City Tan Son Nhat International Airport (SGN) and LAX, at 8,169 miles (13,147 kilometers), while the shortest is the Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport (TPE)–Jeju International Airport (CJU) route, which is a 662 mile (1,065 kilometer) flight.

However, since December 2022 and January 2023, Tigerair Taiwan and South Korea-based T'Way Air have launched flights on the TPE–CJU route, according to data from the aviation analytics company Cirium.

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Quito International Airport (UIO) – New York John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK)

Quito is Ecuador’s capital and the country's most populous city. The city’s Quito International Airport (UIO) is among the busiest airports in South America, yet until June 2023, it had no flights to one of the most populous cities in the US: New York. Since June 2023, avianca has been operating the route between UIO and JFK with an Airbus A320 or Airbus A320neo. The Colombian airline initially offered five weekly flights, expanding the weekly schedule to six itineraries between the two cities.

However, at the time, the route had more than enough passengers to potentially sustain a direct service, coupled with strong bilateral ties between Ecuador and the United States (Ecuador was fully dollarized in 2000). As such, before avianca's direct flights, there were no airlines serving the route between the Ecuadorian capital and the US’ most populous city.

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Photo: Avianca

Then, all UIO-JFK flights involved at least one layover: Bogotá, Colombia (avianca), Florida, US (Jetblue), and Panama City, Panama (Copa Airlines). Travelers looking to fly direct to JFK from Ecuador will need to depart from José Joaquín de Olmedo International Airport (GYE), the country’s second most populous city. Getting from Quito to Guayaquil takes almost an hour’s flight.

In the long-run, one factor that may drive increasing demand for connectivity between Quito and New York is the growing population of Ecuadorians in the US. Since 2000, the Ecuadorian-origin population in the US has increased by almost 200%.

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Ho Chi Minh City Tan Son Nhat International Airport (SGN) – Los Angeles International Airport (LAX)

Despite there being a large population of Vietnamese living in the US, there were no direct flights between the countries until 2021. While ultra-long-range airliners like the Airbus A350 and Boeing 787 can operate the 8,169 mi (13,147 km) flight between SGN and LAX, there might not have been enough demand for direct flights on this route to offset its operating costs.

Travelers on this route are often tourists, relatives, or students, for whom transits are fairly inconsequential – unlike on other long-haul routes such as New York - Singapore, which serve business travelers who, due to tight schedules, are willing to pay a premium for direct flights.

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Photo:Thanhliemnguyen | Shutterstock

For 20 years, the Southeast Asian nation’s aviation industry had been preparing to open a regular air route to the US. It was only in 2019 that the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) granted Vietnam a Category 1 rating under the agency’s International Aviation Safety Assessment (IASA) program. This means the FAA now recognizes that Vietnam’s civil aviation authority meets International CiviI Aviation Organization (ICAO) standards for personnel licensing, operations, and airworthiness.

On November 4, 2021, the FAA officially granted the flag carrier, Vietnam Airlines, permission to operate non-stop commercial flight services between the two nations. Later in the month, the first flight to San Francisco took off from Ho Chi Minh City. Since then, Vietnam Airlines has also introduced direct flights from its base in Hanoi Noi Bai International Airport (HAN) to SFO.

While back then, Vietnam Airlines had been rivaled on this route by Bamboo Airways, an up-and-coming airline that has grown rapidly since its launch in 2017, it was now the sole operator of flights between SGN and SFO. The former airport still has no other direct connection to the US.

Bamboo Airways Dumps Boeing 787s To Australia And Cuts Network

Vietnamese carrier Bamboo Airways is abandoning long-haul services and is operating its last flights to Australia in coming days.

London Heathrow Airport (LHR) – Tribhuvan International Airport (KTM)

London Heathrow recently regained its crown as the Busiest Airport in Europe, after dropping to tenth place last year due to the pandemic. Still, there are no direct flights from this busy hub to Tribhuvan International Airport (KTM) in Kathmandu, Nepal.

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Photo: Getty Images

However, considering there are no direct flights to Kathmandu from anywhere in Europe (except Turkey), the US, and Australia, this comes as no surprise. Traveling to Nepal usually requires a layover in Asia or the Middle East.

Cirium data showed that KTM has 317 weekly departures to non-Nepalese airports, with the busiest route being the KTM–Delhi Indira Gandhi International Airport (DEL) itinerary. The airport also has flights to some of the world's largest international hubs, including Dubai International Airport (DXB) or Doha Hamad International Airport (DOH).

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Photo: Kondoruk | Shutterstock

As a result, most travelers from Europe could transit via DOH, DXB, or Oman. Some might choose to fly to other Asian countries, such as India, Malaysia, or Thailand, before taking a connecting flight to Nepal. Additionally, because Nepal is a landlocked country, many adventurous travelers opt to cross its border via bus from neighboring India, which remains a much cheaper alternative.

Still, there are plenty of airline options to fly via one-stop services, including Air India, Qatar Airways, Emirates, flydubai, THAI, Malaysia Airlines, and Turkish Airlines. Locally based carriers, such as Nepal Airlines or Himalaya Airlines, have 31 and 44 international weekly departures from Nepal, respectively. While Nepal Airlines serves ten destinations, Himalaya Airlines flies to nine.

However, unlike the developments on the SGN-LAX route, the 4,582 mi (7,374 km) direct route between London and Kathmandu may remain unserved in the near future. Considering various constraints, including high elevation of KTM, lack of slots at London's airports, including LHR, and the economics of the route, despite there being a significant Nepalese diaspora in the United Kingdom.

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Opportunities for growth

While these popular routes remain unserved, air travel has allowed us to reach some of the most remote locations in the world. As technological advancements and the demand for air travel continue to spur global air connectivity, the list of unserved routes will eventually diminish. Until then, close to a million yearly passengers traveling on these 10 largest unserved routes will have to continue flying with stopovers.