Trends in airline passenger trip delays (2007 – 2009)

Abstract

Delays in arrival of airline passengers should be the on-time performance metric of the airline passenger transportation system (not flight delays). A passenger trip can experience arrival delays, relative to the ticketed arrival time, as a result of a delayed flight, as well as a diverted flight, cancelled flight, denied boarding, and/or missed connection. This paper describes the results of analysis of annual passenger trip delays for U.S. domestic airline flights from 2007 to 2009. These results are based on estimated itineraries and load factors, and actual airline (flight) on-time performance data available from government websites.