787 and A350 airline operators will open up new Europe-US routes - despite some inertial resistance

The development of the new generation wide body aircraft such as Boeing's 787 and Airbus' A350 may soon lead to direct services from European hubs to a growing number of secondary cities in North America. The EU-US Open Skies agreement opened up the market to a large degree, but hub economics mean that most EU airlines still focus their large wide body operations on the major gateways. In practical terms, once they land at the main US hubs, access to airports beyond remains restricted.

It may be some time before European airlines can operate from and to secondary cities at both ends of the route, but operators of these more fuel efficient and smaller wide bodies can offer direct flights from their hubs in Europe to US cities that were once only 'beyonds'.

Criteria for choosing US cities are likely to include population, importance as a tourist destination, airport size and the presence of network carriers to add feed (possibly in preference to LCCs). New cities such as San Antonio, Nashville, Memphis, New Orleans and even Honolulu may be under consideration in the coming years.