Christopher Emerson, senior vice president of Airbus and head of product strategy and market forecast said that the number of aviation mega-cities will more than double in the next 20 years. This will require as much configurability in aircraft as possible, particularly between major city pairs, and he said that Airbus’s widebody family–the A380, the A350XWB and the A330–are the ideal match for long-haul trunk routes, long-haul developing routes and regional routes, respectively. “For us, our family completely matches the market,” Emerson said. “There is no gap.”
Emerson divided the global passenger market into three types. First, he said, there are 42 aviation mega-cities around the world dealing with around 50 percent of long-haul traffic. Next are the thinner long-haul routes, which are destined to grow to mega-city status in the future. Finally, there are dense short-haul routes constrained by infrastructure. He said the number of hubs (cities dealing with more than 50,000 long-haul passengers a year) will grow in 20 years to a total of 89, carrying 75 percent of global long-haul flights.
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