Del Palmar here, sitting at my timeshare in Mazatlan complaining about these continental connections that the airlines force us to take. Don't you see that the continental connections are just a fraud and scam to take our money and time?
I just flew down to my timeshare last week, and boy let me tell you. These airline companies really have us by the you know whats. You mean to tell me I can't get from NY to my timeshare in Mexico direct? I can only take a continental connection through some hub airport.
This is 2010 and by now you should think that the airlines would be better serving their customers. I've been coming to my timeshare for about 15 years, and each year the direct flights are fewer and fewer. Now, good luck getting to the timeshare direct.
So Marie and I had our continental connection in Houston, exchanged our money and paid an awful commission. There's a good business to be in. Just exchange, buy and resell money for large commissions and exchange fees at the airports. Anywhere there's tourists, set up a little kiosk and start to exchange, buy and resell money for large commissions and exchange fees.
I think it's cheaper to exchange, buy and resell money for your vacation in the USA. In Mexico, the large commissions and exchange fees are even larger. So we do it before going to the timeshare.
The flights to the timeshare was reasonable. Crap food, and Eddie Murphy in a fat-suit movie. But Marie let me have the window seat and one of her green pills. I only looked up from the view to order a gin and tonic, which I know from past experiences, goes really well with her green pills.
By the time we got to the airport in Mazatlan, I was ready to get in a cab and head for my favorite taco stand on the way to the timeshare, but I pressed the red button. For anyone who hasn't been to Mexico before, Customs has a different system than ours (anyone with a tan). In Mexico, you press a button and if the light goes red then you go off to get searched; green and you can proceed. Marie pressed green, but they searched her too.
Of course they didn't find anything because there wasn't anything to find. You can get anything you want in Mexico anyway. What would anyone really be smuggling into Mexico?
I'd love to see about one of those timeshare jet companies for my continental flights without connections. That would be a worthy investment to get to the timeshare in Mexico more often. The grandkids would LOVE that, boy let me tell you. See all their inheritance go to that one purchase. Just think of the look on their faces.
Sorry kids, I'm you wanted to go to college or something, but you know how Grandpa hates a connecting flight.

Continental Connections are Death of Airlines

Continental Connection within North America are an inconvenience for travelers. Why is it impossible to get a direct flight in North America? Continental connections are the reason and this is my complaint.


Continental connections for North America are such an inconvenience for the traveler that they’re frustration extends beyond complaints to a love to hate relationship with flying. The airlines force its clients to make connections on continental flights just because the airline’s best interest is in protecting their bottom-line, instead of offering convenience to the average business flyer.

The airline industry is operating on a dinosaur business model that hasn’t adapted since the 80’s. The airlines pack passengers into some of the largest planes on the market and fly to the airline’s hub forcing the passenger to make a continental connection. A hub is an airport where a specific airline sends all of its flights and passengers must change planes to get to their destination. The airline then offers few direct flights unless you happen to be traveling to that hub’s city.

The arrival of timeshares or timesharing in flight plans came with the introduction of continental connections. Timeshares when referring to airports and flight times has to do with finding a time for a once-delayed flight to take off. Having already missed its narrow window of opportunity to depart for whatever reason, the airline must find a new time for the plane to depart. Often an airline is affiliated with an alliance of airlines, and the alliance will find an upcoming departure of one of its flights and arrange with the airport tower to timeshare the departure time with the two flights. The tower doesn’t complain about the timeshare agreement because it earns the airport a commission from the transfer of the missed departure time to the timeshared departure time.

The timesharing agreement is done to avoid having to pay the airport to assign a new departure time for the flight, a costly expense with time at a premium at continental airports. While there have been no reported aviation accidents due to timeshare flight plans, the danger of something happening exists because the two timeshared flights take off so closely together. The passengers rarely, if ever know about the timeshare agreement for the flight plans. At the risk of sounding ominous, a crash is almost inevitable if the airlines maintain the practice of timeshare departure times from delayed continental connections. Without continental connections on flights within North America, the instances for delayed flights will decrease and the timeshare agreements for flight times would in follow the same pattern. My complaints to the airlines would also stop if continental connections ceased to exist.

Larger planes have a lower cost-per-passenger for the airline when the flight is fully booked, and the airline must sell each seat for the flight to be profitable. The margin is for profit is extremely tight when the airline uses the massive Airbus and Boeing super jets that sending a flight with less than 80% occupancy is a loss for the airline.

It was the 1980s when the airlines began to streamline operations and adopted the practice of continental connections through hub airports. The death of direct flights in continental North America and the appearance of connections gave birth to my complaints, like a phoenix rising rising up from the flames.

Continental connections in North America shouldn’t have to be the norm. One only has to look to Europe and see how the continent’s many airlines operate. Few airlines in Europe operate on the hub system and continental connections, giving passengers more direct flight options and fewer continental connections. Probably no complaints from Europe’s frequent flyers, especially the business traveler with multiple flights weekly and few if any continental connections.