Haven't seen this one in the threads, if it is there, my apologies.

I got a notice audit: found excess gates, remove before end of month. Wasn't planning on using them for a while, so OK.

Went to Gates, no cities listed at all. Went to Routes, still flying, still making money, can change rates.

But no cities listed.

Going to change route, from one end point to another but keep start point. So delete route and then try to add new route. But none of the old gates were freed up, so now out two gates, one of which I was going to use and one I was going to return. Long story short, had to buy gates at both end of route, instead of one. Implies that as long as I leave my current routes in place, no harm but if I change the route or upgrade the plane, I have the additional cost of all new gates.

BTW, the new gates I bought show up fine, which is why I identiifed the audit as the proximate cause

Russ, read my fully explained post and I am sure you can work it out from there

http://forums.airlin...read.php?t=2562

Thanks, but it doesn't clarify what happened to my gates. They aren't so much invisible but as a practical matter gone. Except where there is a route using them. I would have accepted them being invisible, if they had become availible when I deleted a route.

If I can't select a city to add a route, even after deleting a route using that city, the gate is gone.

So my conclusion remains. Don't change my routes. All the gates I had before the audit are history.

They are not invisible. They are unavailble, finished, history.

In order to get the gates back, you have to close the routes and then the gate (1 slot) should disappear. Then you have to release the gate and make the route over again. It is a pain, but it is the only way to get it back to normal.

That didn't work for me, when I did that, it said I didn't have enough open slots. Those gates seem to be truly lost, not invisible. Unless I have to close all my routes and start over?

Maybe 1/2 price or maybe it cost 1 gate if there are multiple gates returned.

Don't think it should be a freebe. Otherwise you could game the system to block out other airlines.

And you can't rent another gate at that city for a month or two. So you don't have some one rent, return, rent, and so on with the effect that the gates never come on the market long enough for someone else to get them.

so a question regarding all of this...

If I remove a plane that uses an invisible gate, ie LGA, will I lose the ability to use that gate for the sake of bumping to a larger aircraft?

I tried that and I was unable to use the gates (slots) that should have been opened up.

Oewie ! I got my gates back ! Happy happy.

Thnx a million.

Now I just hope that i'm not the only one and all the others got theirs back 2. Cuz if that were the case and I were them .. this post would piss me off

Got my active gates back (in use for routes) but lost one where I had inactivated a route and never got a chance to return it. I did have plans for it but in all, for me, s**t happens, move on. Enjoying the game. As long as I don't have to repurchase gates everytime I change routes

in real life they wont give back the money even if you did not use it for christs sakes.. you paid to use it .. not to not use it then get the money back, the owner of the terminal in this example would not make any money..


in the real world its use and if not.. your fault for not useing it and its a loss. just like in this game.. seriously it would make NO sense to have a refund for something you claimed you would use.. that you didnt

maybe yes somethigns do, but not when it comes to terminals where you'd agree to use them and then end up getting rid of them because you couldnt find a way to use it..

the game would be to damn redicously easy then because then you wouldnt really loose money... thats another point so just get over it and use the gates

[Edited on 11/1/2005 by Nathaniel]

in RL, gates are considered assets and are sold and traded like any other asset. Maybe AE should set up a used gate market like the used aircraft market.

If you rent gates from an airport and then decided NOT to use them i think you should get a full refund.

Limit the refund to when you have assigned no aircraft and within one game month of applying for the gate...

What about a used gate market like the used aircraft market. Gates are assets of the airlines in RL and are sold.

The whole arguement about being realistic is besides the point really, since in real life you do not purchase a gate, you get slots. A certain time assigned, for which you pay. May be included in handling costs, may not be. In any event, it is not true there is a fixed amount of payment. If I had an airline and flew twice a day to Heathrow, I'd be paying for that. Now, if I would increase to three, or four, my slot expenses would increase.

The system is a lot more complex than just purchasing gates. You need licenses to be issued, you have to request the slots in advance and wait and see what is allocated to you. Don't make the mistake of thinking it is an easy matter..

I beg to disagree. Although I am sure there is an infinite number of arrangements worldwide, in the US I believe that the arrangement is:

Lease gates from the airport. These leases are assets in that you can sell, sublease, transfer or assign the gates. Or return them to the airport (anyone know what USAir did in Pittsburgh?)
In addition, there are landing fees. These factor in the plane size and number of passengers. I know there was talk about premiums for landing/TO times but I don't know if any airport has instituted that.
So far as Landing/TO slots, I am not sure that there is a fee for that outside FFA but it wouldn't surpirse me.

Add landing fees as a recurring expense. The fees could be scaled just like the gate costs. And possibly scale them by aircraft size (like in RL)

The purpose of this would be to encourage small airlines to use small (less popular airports)

Charge for unused slots at an airport. If you use one or 5 slots, it still represents one gate. And a lot of gates are being used for only one slot, thereby consuming the availible number of gates at popular airports.

There are numerous ways to institute this depending on what the objective is. For example, if you want to affect feeder airlines, then there will be an economic cost to owning a gate an not flying it.

One scenario, allow one idle slot but charge for any more idle slots.

Charge on a sliding scale, no charge for airports with more than 10 availble gates, a small charge for airports with 0-10 and a large charge for airports with 0 (maybe sliding with the gate fee).

The objective is to pay for idle resources in a scarcity environment.

It may also discourage flying big planes with low load factors to small airports

Also, it would cause an additional cost for the $1 airfares. Wouldn't prevent it but it would make it more expensive.

the advantage of feeder airlines can be reduced by making more difficult to gain economic advantage from flipping the starter aircraft. The vast majority of the used sales are the starter aircraft. (which makes sense if you want to graduate from the noobies)

Take the J-31 and Beech out of the used aircraft sales. Allow them to be used as a credit for a larger aircraft but not direct used sales. Only one plane can be used as credit on a larger one. That would prevent an immediate flip of both for a larger aircraft.

This wouldn't prevent feeders but it would mean that the game would have to be played for a while before they could gain any benefit. Make them work for it.

Also, if the above was instituted, prevent an airline from selling ANY aircraft in their first year of existence.

And/Or cannot sell until they have $5M (choose a figure) in profits.

Again, the objective is to make it harder to get immediate econmic gain with no effort.

isn't this already included in gate costs? If it's not, would it be?

I think gate costs are constant no matter what type of aircraft or number of slots used.

Landing fees would be charged dependent on number of slots used and the fee would be calculated by the size of aircraft used.

My thought would be that a j31/b1900 (20 seats) would be cheap per landing but 4 landings would be more expensive than a Q400 at 80 seats. It would encourage the use of larger aircraft.

A variation on this would be to impose this cost only at airports whose gates have gone to zero. So small airlines would not be penalized for flying to under used airports but would have an economic incentive to minimize the number of landing at fully utilized airports.

This may also make it uneconomical to fly only one slot at an airport with a small plane.

This is all based on the premise that gates are limited and that airline are constrained from growing because they cannot get gates at popular airports. And that the reason that gates are consumed quickly is that airlines find it profitable ( at reduced margin) to own gates and under fill them.

If that premise is not valid then never mind :sdrool:

The current situation affects game play in that it may be better to suffer the short term costs of under utilizing gates then the long term effect of not being able to expand due to the limited number of gates.

My suggestion simply makes it more expensive to sit on gates without using all the slots.

Just wondering, if the database goes back, would one recieve their cash back or would it be lost? Thanks for your help/advice in this situation, because I don't know if ti reverts back if that means that the money would be returned. Thanks a lot

P.S.: Do you think it will be "normal" by the month change?

Reverting means that the game would be restored to some point in the past and all game play after that point would be gone, as though it never happened. So your money would not be 'lost' it never happened because that point in the game never happened. for example, if it was restored to Oct 1, then all the game play after that is gone. No money earned and no money spent. All Route changes, gone. All purchases, sales and bankrupties, gone. You have to play October over again.

I'm swapping the database (As i said i would in the previous announcement)...

This may result in a downtime and a loss of data from this point forward...

I'm hoping the game will be back to "normal" inside 12hrs...



Just a heads up as i'm not sure at what point the database will "disappear" so to speak...


:airplane

Are you going to let us know when it is safe to go back into the water?

But what is wrong with selling one to buy a new plane now? Perhaps someone should investigate airlines that only sell planes and then are abandoned.

My idea is to allow the trade in of the aircraft for a new one. Limit the used aircraft market to larger aircraft. It simply prevents the flipping of starter aircraft for $. And I have yet to see any bargains on the used aircrat site.

Not that it couldn't be done with the larger aircraft, but it would require more time and effort, therefore reducing it.

Add the number of total gates availible for each airport to the strategy guide. There is currently a list of airports and gate prices.

this may quite some of the questions on where all the gates went.

Would be nice to know exactly the Starting numbers in each city, as a lot of players have different views on the exact numbers. Was reading one old post said 60 per city, well that miles off target. Some may have but not all....

Also, I know from a programming view point this may be impossible, but if in the event of a new airline starting, that number will rise to show the TRUE actual numbers, not a guess that there may be so many. Just my view and comments, others may want to add?

Yes, I should make it clear that I was talking about the total number of gates at start and not the dynamic number of gates availible at any particular moment.

Works for me. Month change now happens when I am awake.

I know that this post may be looked upon as unworthy of the time of the AE admin, but I just find it frustrating how constructing a terminal is almost penalized in the game in that, once it is built, all the gates an airline has accumulated at the airport as given up, and able to be purchased by other airlines. This basically means that an airline is paying o have more competition, though I know in the long run it does pay off. Thats just my thoughts as I was contemplating building a terminal, so thanks for spending your time (possibly wasting it) reading this.
-Song

Part of the problem is that in RL, a terminal is built because the airline needs more gates than it can get or the old one needs refurbishment. The latter case doesn't concern the game but the former should apply. Although, I think in most cases the old gates are released to other airlines just like in the game.

So a more realistic scenario would be to build a new terminal of 25 gates, you would have to give up 10 or 15 or some number back to the general pool of availble gates.

Think about this: if you have 25 gates in one terminal, and you decide to build a brand new 30 gate terminal, what happens to the other 25 gates? You vacate them, which allows other airlines to move in. It's perfectly logical and realistic, although at some airports there wouldnt be room for all the different terminals built in this game.

I would say that you could find examples from around the world that have resulted in anything from a net decrease of gates to a completely new set of gates.

So for game purposes, the question is, how do you want to play it.
I do think the point concerning losing traffic is valid. I don't think airlines in RL want to lose volume by building new terminals.

Does anyone have an example of an airline building a new terminal and giving up old gates? And was there a new runway involved?

Well, in real life, if an airline builds a new terminal, the gates do get released to the market, but no airline could take the 20 gates that United released at Concourse A @ IAD after the building of Concourse G(until Independence, but thats another story ). These gates were released to the public market. Therefore this aspect of AE is accurate. I have heard of an airline moving from one terminal to another(like airtran at TPA i believe), and the terminal was either closed down or destroyed. I dunno if thats possible to implement, it would sort of solve this problem(i.e. you build a 50 gate terminal at DFW for 500 mill, you can demolish the old gates for 250 mill).

Here in Philly, USAir built two terminals and didn't release any gates. They just increased the traffic for one (the international) and replaced the commuter pad with a terminal (F). (I guess we can't count the ones freed up in Pittsburgh when they closed that as a terminal)

Like I said, there is an example of everything in RL.

What factors should I consider when deciding to graduate from Q400 to A318/B737.

I am not sure that there is any value to go to a RJ. The ROI seems to be higher waiting a little while longer and getting the bigger plane.

And should I bother with the 318 0r -600 or go bigger?

When you run out of possible Q400 routes. A319 would be a good jet to start with.

What would you consider a good Q400 route? I have a feeling that I am not quite done with the Q400's but soon.