Economic viability

Range:

Concorde is only able to serve s<»mc of the medium range overwater routes. This is an inattrac – uvely limned part of the market. To gam a sufficient pan of the market, future SCT must serve the important overwater long range routes. This, for the traits-Pacific routes, is more than 5500 ran range. Range is even more important than speed! For its limited range Concorde did not find a market, although Concorde’s range was at the achievable limits Also, the American SST, the Boeing В2707. failed for its insufficient range |45] and its uncontrolled growth of weight, even when environmental concerns were cited to stop the program (46) (which luckily limned the li­ability of Boeing).

Operations:

Today, there exists a very expensive environment for air traffic operations airports with its buildings and installations, hangars and air traffic control (АТС). New aircraft may require some additional installations, hut the necessary investments must be paid by the money earned with those aircraft And at least for the introduction of the new aircraft, success depends on the ability to cope with the existing environment. Time spent at the airport for debarking and embarking of passengers, serv icing of the aircraft, refuelling etc. must be minimized

• Aircraft dimensions (length, span or occupied ground area) ниш be compatible with exist­ing installations at the relevant airports

• Aircraft accessibility (door*) must be compatible w ith existing airport installations, service ports should he compatible w ith usual procedures

• Aircraft accessibility must allow for parallel de-/cmhark. service, fueling, etc.

• Aircraft supply needs mast be compatible with existing (big) systems, e g. fuel type.

• To serve the many routes with overland legs, subsonic cruise performance must be about as good as the supersonic one. Concorde has only poor subsonic performance.

Cost and fares:

A new SCT will become a success only if the manufacturer of the aircraft and the airlines oper­ating this aircraft will earn money with this aircraft. This requires production of a sufficient number of aircraft at a profitable price for the manufacturer, and operating costs which arc lower than the money paid by the passengers:

• To reduce seat mile cost and to serve a large market, an SCT must transport many passen­gers (size effect), at least as much as subsonic long range aircraft (e. g. A340k (Smaller SCT w ould – at first – only serve full fare passengers, but after a short period airlines will begin to introduce reduced fares to fill empty seats – because empty scats arc the most expensive seats-, and this leads to the situation we have lixlay with mostly km fare tick­ets )

• To gain a sufficient part of the market, a future SCT must serve all classes.

• Speed pays (see cars, trains, air traffic) but a surcharge must stay in acceptable limits It seems that the travelling public accepts surcharges of about the money they would cam for the time they saved by increased speed, even for holiday trips.

• An SCT with those (low) fares must still allow a profit for the manufacturer and airlines. And the manufacturer must sell many aircraft in order to provide an acceptable price. This becomes impossible with pure exclusivity.