NYC Penn Station 7th Avenue Entrance 2013

A transport hub is a place where passengers and

cargo Cargo consists of bulk goods conveyed by water, air, or land. In economics, freight is cargo that is transported at a freight rate for commercial gain. ''Cargo'' was originally a shipload but now covers all types of freight, including trans ...

are exchanged between vehicles and/or between transport modes.

Public transport Public transport (also known as public transportation, public transit, mass transit, or simply transit) is a system of transport for passengers by group travel systems available for use by the general public unlike private transport, typi ...

hubs include

railway station Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport that transfers passengers and goods on wheeled vehicles running on rails, which are incorporated in tracks. In contrast to road transport, where the vehicles run on a prep ...

rapid transit station A metro station or subway station is a station for a rapid transit system, which as a whole is usually called a "metro" or "subway". A station provides a means for passengers to purchase tickets, board trains, and evacuate the system in the ...

s, bus stops,

tram stop A tram stop, tram station, streetcar stop, or light rail station is a place designated for a tram, streetcar, or light rail vehicle to stop so passengers can board or alight it. Generally, tram stops share most characteristics of bus stops, ...

s, airports and

ferry slip A ferry slip is a specialized docking facility that receives a ferryboat or train ferry. A similar structure called a barge slip receives a barge or car float that is used to carry wheeled vehicles across a body of water. Often a ferry intend ...

s. Freight hubs include

classification yard A classification yard (American and Canadian English (Canadian National Railway use)), marshalling yard ( British, Hong Kong, Indian, Australian, and Canadian English (Canadian Pacific Railway use)) or shunting yard (Central Europe) is a railway ...

s, airports,

seaport A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as H ...

s and truck terminals, or combinations of these. For

private transport Private transport (as opposed to public transport) is the personal or individual use of transportation which are not available for use by the general public, where in theory the user can decide freely on the time and route of transit ('choice ...

by car, the parking lot functions as a unimodal hub.

History

Historically, an interchange service in the scheduled passenger air transport industry involved a "through plane" flight operated by two or more airlines where a single aircraft was used with the individual airlines operating it with their own flight crews on their respective portions of a direct, no-change-of-plane multi-stop flight. In the U.S., a number of air carriers including

Alaska Airlines Alaska Airlines is a major American airline headquartered in SeaTac, Washington, within the Seattle metropolitan area. It is the sixth largest airline in North America when measured by fleet size, scheduled passengers carried, and the num ...

American Airlines American Airlines is a major airlines of the United States, major US-based airline headquartered in Fort Worth, Texas, within the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex. It is the Largest airlines in the world, largest airline in the world when measured ...

, Braniff International Airways, Continental Airlines,

Delta Air Lines Delta Air Lines, Inc., typically referred to as Delta, is one of the major airlines of the United States and a legacy carrier. One of the world's oldest airlines in operation, Delta is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia. The airline, along w ...

Eastern Airlines Eastern Air Lines, also colloquially known as Eastern, was a major United States airline from 1926 to 1991. Before its dissolution, it was headquartered at Miami International Airport in an unincorporated area of Miami-Dade County, Florida. Ea ...

Frontier Airlines (1950-1986) Frontier Airlines is a major ultra-low-cost U.S. airline headquartered in Denver, Colorado. It operates flights to over 100 destinations throughout the United States and 31 international destinations, and employs more than 3,000 staff. The ca ...

Hughes Airwest Hughes Airwest was a regional airline in the western United States, backed by Howard Hughes' Summa Corporation. Its original name in 1968 was Air West and the air carrier was owned by Nick Bez. Hughes Airwest flew routes in the wes ...

National Airlines (1934-1980) A national airline is a country's flag carrier A flag carrier is a transport company, such as an airline or shipping company, that, being locally registered in a given sovereign state, enjoys preferential rights or privileges accorded by ...

Pan Am Pan American World Airways, originally founded as Pan American Airways and commonly known as Pan Am, was an American airline that was the principal and largest international air carrier and unofficial overseas flag carrier of the United States ...

, Trans World Airlines ( TWA),

United Airlines United Airlines, Inc. (commonly referred to as United), is a major American airline headquartered at the Willis Tower in Chicago, Illinois.

and

Western Airlines Western Airlines was a major airline based in California, operating in the Western United States including Alaska and Hawaii, and western Canada, as well as to New York City, Boston, Washington, D.C., and Miami and to Mexico City, London and ...

previously operated such cooperative "through plane" interchange flights on both domestic and/or international services with these schedules appearing in their respective system timetables.

pioneered the

hub and spoke A hub is the central part of a wheel that connects the axle to the wheel itself. Hub, The Hub, or hubs may refer to: Geography Pakistan * Hub Tehsil, Balochistan, an administrative division ** Hub, Balochistan, capital city of the tehsil * Hub ...

system for aviation in 1955 from its hub in

Atlanta, Georgia Atlanta ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Georgia. It is the seat of Fulton County, the most populous county in Georgia, but its territory falls in both Fulton and DeKalb counties. With a population of 498,7 ...

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

, in an effort to compete with Eastern Air Lines. FedEx adopted the hub and spoke model for overnight package delivery during the 1970s. When the United States airline industry was

deregulated Deregulation is the process of removing or reducing state regulations, typically in the economic sphere. It is the repeal of governmental regulation of the economy. It became common in advanced industrial economies in the 1970s and 1980s, as a ...

in 1978, Delta's hub and spoke paradigm was adopted by several airlines. Many airlines around the world operate hub-and-spoke systems facilitating passenger connections between their respective flights.

Public transport

Intermodal passenger transport Intermodal passenger transport, also called mixed-mode commuting, involves using two or more modes of transportation in a journey. Mixed-mode commuting is often used to combine the strengths (and offset the weaknesses) of various transportati ...

hubs in public transport include bus stations,

s and

metro station A metro station or subway station is a station for a rapid transit system, which as a whole is usually called a "metro" or "subway". A station provides a means for passengers to purchase tickets, board trains, and evacuate the system in the ...

s, while a major transport hub, often multimodal (bus and rail), may be referred to as a transport centre or, in

American English American English, sometimes called United States English or U.S. English, is the set of varieties of the English language native to the United States. English is the most widely spoken language in the United States and in most circumstances i ...

, as a transit center."A transit center is a major transit hub served by several bus or rail lines.
Tri-Met: Transit Centers
Sections of city streets that are devoted to functioning as transit hubs are referred to as

transit mall A transit mall is a street, or set of streets, in a city or town along which automobile traffic is prohibited or greatly restricted and only public transit vehicles, bicycles, and pedestrians are permitted. Transit malls are instituted by communi ...

s. In cities with a

central station Central stations or central railway stations emerged in the second half of the nineteenth century as railway stations that had initially been built on the edge of city centres were enveloped by urban expansion and became an integral part of the ...

, that station often also functions as a transport hub in addition to being a railway station. Journey planning involving transport hubs is more complicated than direct trips, as journeys will typically require a transfer at the hub. Modern electronic journey planners for public transport have a digital representation of both the stops and transport hubs in a network, to allow them to calculate journeys that include transfers at hubs.

Airports

Airports have a twofold hub function. First they concentrate passenger traffic into one place for onward transportation. This makes it important for airports to be connected to the surrounding transport infrastructure, including roads, bus services, and railway and

rapid transit Rapid transit or mass rapid transit (MRT), also known as heavy rail or metro, is a type of high-capacity public transport generally found in urban areas. A rapid transit system that primarily or traditionally runs below the surface may be ...

systems. Secondly some airports function as intra-modular hubs for the airlines, or

airline hub An airline hub or hub airport is an airport used by one or more airlines to concentrate passenger traffic and flight operations. Hubs serve as transfer (or stop-over) points to help get passengers to their final destination. It is part of the ...

s. This is a common strategy among network airlines who fly only from limited number of airports and usually will make their customers change planes at one of their hubs if they want to get between two cities the airline doesn't fly directly between. Airlines have extended the hub-and-spoke model in various ways. One method is to create additional hubs on a regional basis, and to create major routes between the hubs. This reduces the need to travel long distances between nodes that are close together. Another method is to use focus cities to implement point-to-point service for high traffic routes, bypassing the hub entirely.

Freight

There are usually three kinds of freight hubs: sea-road, sea-rail and road-rail, though they can also be sea-road-rail. With the growth of

containerization Containerization is a system of intermodal freight transport using intermodal containers (also called shipping containers and ISO containers). Containerization is also referred as "Container Stuffing" or "Container Loading", which is the p ...

intermodal freight transport Intermodal freight transport involves the transportation of freight in an intermodal container or vehicle, using multiple modes of transportation (e.g., rail, ship, aircraft, and truck), without any handling of the freight itself when changing ...

has become more efficient, often making multiple legs cheaper than through services—increasing the use of hubs.

References

{{Public transport Hub Transit centers

History

Public transport

Airports

Freight

See also

References