List of main US gateway airports per continent

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Originally Posted by The Lawspeaker

Neither Madrid or Rome are real airport hubs (they are certainly important but they aren't the real big players). London (Heathrow, Gatwick), Paris (Charles de Gaulle) and Amsterdam (Schiphol) are much more important.

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Yup by order the most important ones are :

Heathrow
CDG
Schiphol
Frankfurt

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Originally Posted by The Lawspeaker

Neither Madrid or Rome are real airport hubs. London (Heathrow, Gatwick), Paris (Charles de Gaulle) and Amsterdam (Schiphol) are much more important.

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Actually, Madrid is an important link between Europe and Latin America, principally thanks to Iberia and to some extent Air Europa and various Latin American airlines, especially Avianca and LATAM. Meanwhile, Rome-Fiumicino is the main hub for Alitalia, which is an especially important airline for connections within Italy as well as to other countries in SE Europe.

But the main point is that Madrid and Rome are capital cities of two of Europe's biggest countries. Therefore, to ignore them from your range of destinations means that you cannot be genuinely taken as a gateway to Europe.

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Originally Posted by KMack

Frankfurt is right there also.

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Originally Posted by MsSPF

Yup by order the most important ones are :

Heathrow
CDG
Schiphol
Frankfurt

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I somehow always forget bl.... Frankfurt. Well, yes, it wasn't the brightest airport I've ever visited..

I know from CDG, Air France serves at least 14 cities in the US, it's huge! I think they are the most important destinations for the company

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Originally Posted by Tooting Carmen

Actually, Madrid is an important link between Europe and Latin America, principally thanks to Iberia and to some extent Air Europa and various Latin American airlines, especially Avianca and LATAM. Meanwhile, Rome-Fiumicino is the main hub for Alitalia, which is an especially important airline for connections within Italy as well as to other countries in SE Europe.

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You forget that CDG, Heathrow and Schiphol offer direct connections to much of Latin America as well and there are direct flights from the U.S as well. Madrid's importance is overstated. And no: for Americans flying to SE-Europe, he will either fly directly or via the Big Three.

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Originally Posted by MsSPF

I know from CDG, Air France serves at least 14 cities in the US, it's huge! I think they are the most important destinations for the company

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Same with KLM in Schiphol. They are, pretty much, one airliner so they should be seen as one airliner with two hubs.

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Originally Posted by Tooting Carmen

By Latin America, I mean everywhere from Mexico southwards in the mainland Americas. Although Cuba, DR and PR count too, for the purpose of this thread I counted them as Caribbean rather than Latin American. In any event, the point is that the absence or presence of flights between two places isn't just to do with tourism and business - there is immigration too.

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Then you have to count Cancun as Latin America, which is super popular, serviced directly by most A and B airports directly.
For the lack of a better term I would toss Cancun into the Caribbean category, that is what they compete with. The 3 bigs there are
Cancun, Punta Cana, Montego. Historically Americans do not visit Cuba. There isn't a lot of traffic to S. America. Mexico City is probably up in the rankings somewhere.

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Originally Posted by The Lawspeaker

Same with KLM in Schiphol. They are, pretty much, one airliner so they should be seen as one airliner with two hubs.

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I was not sure about KLM because despite being in the same group, both entities are still very independant from each other with different CEOs and offers etc... Good to know! I know some destinations are sometimes different depending on the company (Air France or KLM)

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Originally Posted by The Lawspeaker

You forget that CDG, Heathrow and Schiphol offer direct connections to much of Latin America as well and there are direct flights from the U.S as well. Madrid's importance is overstated. And no: for Americans flying to SE-Europe, he will either fly directly or via the Big Three.

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You and KMack seem to be missing the point here. The point is that it is extremely common for US airports to have direct flights to London (mainly Heathrow, sometimes Gatwick), Paris CDG, Amsterdam and Frankfurt, but not so common for them to have direct flights to Madrid and Rome. Therefore, only those that do can properly be described as gateways to Europe.:D

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Originally Posted by KMack

Then you have to count Cancun as Latin America, which is super popular, serviced directly by most A and B airports directly.
For the lack of a better term I would toss Cancun into the Caribbean category, that is what they compete with. The 3 bigs there are
Cancun, Punta Cana, Montego. Historically Americans do not visit Cuba. There isn't a lot of traffic to S. America. Mexico City is probably up in the rankings somewhere.

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OK good points. All the same, South Americans are more likely to visit the US rather than the opposite, and in big numbers too. What's more, given all the immigrants from Colombia, Venezuela, Peru, Brazil and Argentina in quite a few US cities, then surely there'd be a lot of people visiting relatives in both directions?