Continuous Indirect Connectivity Model for the
Evaluation of Hub-and-Spoke Operations
Sang Yong Leea, Kwang Eui Yoob, Yonghwa Parkc
a Airline
b
Marketing Team, Incheon International Airport Corporation, Incheon, 400-700 Republic of Korea
School of Air Transport, Transportation and Logistics, Korea Aerospace University, Gyeonggi-do, 411-791
Republic of Korea
c Asia Pacific School of Logistics, Inha University, Incheon, 402-751 Republic of Korea
Abstract
The deregulation of aviation markets in Europe and the United Sates led airlines
to reconfigure their networks into hub-and-spoke systems. Recent movements
towards “Open Skies” in the Asian aviation market are also expected to prompt the
reformation of airlines’ networks in the region. A fine connectivity index is a crucial
tool for airlines and airport authorities to estimate the degree of hub operation.
Therefore, this paper suggests a new index, Continuous Indirect Connectivity Index
(CICI), for measuring the coordination of airlines’ flight schedules, applying it to the
Asian aviation market as well as the European and the American markets. CICI
consists of three components: (i) temporal connectivity to identify long haul and long
haul flight connection, (ii) spatial connectivity to differentiate the attractiveness by
de-routing distance with continuous linear function, and (iii) relative intensity to
reflect the effect of direct flight frequency on transfer routes. CICI is evaluated to
examine a casual relationship through regression analyses with two dependent
variables of the number of transfer passengers and transfer rates. Compared with
Danesi’s index and Doganis’ index through evaluation processes, CICI has a higher
coefficient value of determination, implying that it explains the relationship between
connectivity and transfer passengers more precisely.
Keywords: Connectivity, Hub-and-spoke, Airline networks, Transfer passengers

Corresponding author
E-mail address: air@inha.ac.kr (Y. Park)