Inbound

From next July, United will fly a Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner between its San Francisco hub – which the airline is expanding in the context of an ongoing fight over Los Angeles LAX between the three major US airlines – and Auckland. The airline has already converted its LAX-Sydney- Melbourne tag flights on a Boeing 747-400 into two nonstop services, Sydney with a 777-200 and Melbourne with a 787-9. Sydney will also see a Dreamliner from March 2016, creating a two-and-a-half-class passenger experience that is consistent, if neither luxurious in the B/E Diamond seats in business class (which lack the direct aisle access that is the current gold standard) nor particularly comfortable in the economy 3-3-3 configuration, although the extra legroom in economy plus is useful for elites or passengers willing to pay up.

American Airlines starts its LAX-Sydney flights in mid-December, on board its flagship Boeing 777-300ER. American has a reasonable first class seat, the same top-notch Zodiac Cirrus business class Cathay Pacific uses (the exact same seat, mind, licensed from CX, with all the customisations the airline made), and a disappointing 3-4‑3 economy class. There’s also an extra-legroom economy mini-cabin, which is in the process of being converted from the decent 3-3-3 layout to the elbow-crunching 3-4-3.

American will also begin daily flights on a Boeing 787-8 between LAX and Auckland next June, with its custom Zodiac forwards-backwards herringbone seat with direct aisle access in business class, plus the narrow 3-3-3 configuration in an extra-legroom cabin and regular economy. The developing Jetstar network in New Zealand will be a key codeshare partner for this flight, as AA CEO Doug Parker and Qantas CEO Alan Joyce emphasised at the Wellington announcement of the route.

For passengers who don’t mind a stopover, Hawaiian Airlines is renovating its aircraft, adding a new business class seat and more extralegroom economy rows. Business debuts the Maxima seat from Optimares, which uses a novel mini-gangway approach to enable direct aisle access despite a 2-2-2 configuration of seat pairs that face away from each other.

Economy remains 2-4-2.

Looking towards the routes flying west, Qatar Airways will fly a Boeing 777-300ER to Sydney from March, and an Airbus A350-900 to Adelaidefrom May. The second-largest Gulf carrier is clearly keen to expand on the Kangaroo Route and as a transit point between Australia and Africa – as well as to the Americas from its early Australian port Perth.

Perhaps strangely, Qatar’s Sydney flight will offer a worse passenger experience than Adelaide, as the result of the older Boeing 777-300ER used on the SYD flights. Business on these flights is a 2-2-2 fully flat bed of an older generation, while the airline is in the middle of refitting economy from a comfortable 3-3-3 layout to the tight 3-4-3 configuration. The A350- 900 used to Adelaide, meanwhile, sees the top-notch B/E Super Diamond outward-facing herringbone seats in a 1-2-1 layout and a spacious 3-3-3 down the back.

In China, the big three carriers are consolidating their position, with the big changes being closer working with Air New Zealand and Qantas. China Eastern has a new Shanghai Pudong-Brisbane flight starting in mid-January, operated by an Airbus A330-200. While the business class configuration could be either the 2-2-2 flat beds or 1-2‑1 outward-facing herringbone beds with direct aisle access, economy is the standard 2-4-2 down the back.

China Eastern is, of course, Qantas’s China codeshare partner, with the icy relationship between Mascot and Cathay City still frozen over.

Air China is Air New Zealand’s Chinese partner, with new flights between Beijing and Auckland starting December on Airbus A330-200s.

These will have fully flat business class beds in a 2-2-2 layout, with the standard 2-4‑2 economy seats down the back.

China Southern is the Chinese carrier starting with the largest number of flights into the region. Despite no new routes, the Guangzhou-based carrier is upgauging a Sydney flight with Airbus A380s for the peak southern summer season, returning the superjumbo to Kingsford-Smith.

Inflight internet, meanwhile – still lacking among any Australian or New Zealand carrier – is available on American and United’s new aircraft, with Qatar Airways an early adopter of the Inmarsat GlobalXpress global Ka-band system (see October Australian Aviation).

All in all, it’s an exciting time to be a passenger, just as long as the airlines provide all those passengers with the information they need to make an informed decision about the level of experience they’ll be receiving for their fare.