Flying in Europe, it is about a 50/50 chance as to whether you get on the plane from a jet bridge or you take a bus to the plane parked on the tarmac. In contrast, most US airports have jet bridges, even when the plane is small unless it is a very small airport.
Why?
Maybe something to do with ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) compliance? Europe tolerates a lot less accessibility by necessity since they have so many older buildings, so maybe that translates over into having more tolerance for stairs when boarding planes?
Land availability. European cities have been occupied for way longer, so there is a lot lower chance of some huge unused space for a massive airport. Smaller airports are more likely to have you board/unboard on the tarmac. Denver airport is more than 10x the size of the biggest airport in all of Europe. It’s also bigger than Zurich, the whole city is smaller than the Denver airport.
No way!? That’s insane. Wow. Wow. Thanks for this fact
Most American airports are space constrained, including many of the oldest ones in the country. The old airports in the US generally use jet bridges even when they are constrained by space.
Jet bridges only work with airplanes above a certain size, such as Boeing 737 and above. Airports that also serve smaller aircraft need to have infrastructure in place to board from the apron, and once that infrastructure is in place it can be used for both big and small aircraft.
Boarding from the apron is a lot more flexible as it’s basically a matter of getting the aircraft onto any available parking spot, and then shuttle passengers to and from the aircraft. So delayed flights are more likely to use one of these spots, as the Jet bridge schedule requires a lot of planning.
While the above probably isn’t a root cause, it’s definitely a factor.
Source: Frequent flyer, on both big and small aircraft.
I’ve taken jet bridges to board Embraer 175’s in the USA. In contrast, I’ve gone up stairs for an Airbus A321 in Europe.
I guess it’s mainly for convenience. Americans demand much more convenience, and complain loudly about the smallest things.
Until recently, La Guardia in NY, and Philly airports had pretty regular busses to commuter jets (Embrairs, Canadians, Bombardier, etc). Philly still busses between terminals. I think DCA does as well. Not sure about others. I used to go through LGA, PHL, & DCA pretty often. The CLT (have to include “the”) also has a lot of outdoor boarding from terminal E (the commuter terminal).
So, in the US, you see busses more in larger airports that are more land-constrained for terminal space. Beyond this, you’re getting into small regional airports when you see more outdoor boarding. As to why, it’s probably just in response to expectations of US air passengers.
Buses between terminals is a lot more common and I’ve even seen buses acting as airplanes in the USA.
I can see some US airports using bussing, but it feels like the practice is far more commonplace in the EU than the US. It is also odd given than EU airports appear to be newer on average to US airports.
seen buses acting as airplanes in the USA
Them Duke boys are at it again
All I can add is a personal anecdote but most of the smaller regional airports I have ever flown through have boarded from the tarmac vs a jet bridge.
Yeah, but I’ve taken the bus to the airplane at major airports in the EU including Frankfurt. In contrast, the airports in the US that I’ve had to board on stairs are much smaller.
Oh yeah I’ve never taken a bus to the plane before
This is a great question and I wanna know too. The first time I set foot on a tarmac was probably when I was 22, and I had flown dozens of times before then.
