^ Agreed.

From my point of view, a relatively frequent flyer who never knows what sort of aircraft he's in because I only care about how long it takes to get to where I'm going, to me flying commercially has not evolved one bit in the last few decades. Unless, of course, you count the number of pat-downs you are likely to be subjected to, or noticing how they employ slightly uglier stewardess' for every year.

How can flying today be less efficient than Concorde from the late 60s was (I had to look that up)? I know we have a lot of people interested in this sort of thing here on TS so I am curious to hear why. I mean, sure ... comfort has been improved, but I don't care about the range of the plane, what the in-flight monitor resolution is how the the aisles are organized - I just want to get where the hell I am going as quick as possible. There's a super-train being built in Asia, with speeds up to 600 miles per hour .... but I am still flying charter to the Canary Islands as slow as I did back when BMW made the 2002 Touring.

 

Supersonic commercial will never, ever happen again from one of the established carriers. It would require a new, luxury airline startup and a galactic crapload of money.

It would arguably be easier to do these days given the advances in composite technology and supercruise engines, but unless you know someone with 5-10 billion burning a hole in their pocket...

Concorde, for all its flaws, was a magical moment in aviation history.

 

Everything you said I completely agree with. It makes me slightly nostalgic and misty eyed thinking that the pinnacle of actual performance could be surpassed but isn't.

Car-guy-analogy:
Like if Ferrari were to stop everything and only make the Prius and the Camry without changing a thing from the Toyota version.

I talked to my uncle about a sonic boom corridor that happened when Barack Hussein Obama visited Seattle and some numb-nut in a float plane violated his no-fly safety bubble. Secret Service scrambed F-15s that were there in less than 20 minutes... But they also caused a bit of a ruckus up a good chunk of the west coast.

Its true that faster than sound flight is really only feasible over zero-population zones. But why isn't it being used for that now? I still fairly sure there is a market for just that. Imagine connecting LA and Japan, New York and London, Abu Dhabi and London or NY... there isnt anything important between any of those...

 

Actually it's perfectly feasible to do supersonic speeds at reasonably high altitudes (say 30k+ feet). The very minor "pop" you hear from a supersonic aircraft at those altitudes isn't going to hurt anything. The FAA noise requirements in that regard are more than slightly draconian.

Money. 99% of commercial air travel is all about the money. Nobody wants to pay for service, speed or experience anymore. They want a $150 6-hour bus ride across the country.

While there is a high speed international and domestic (given FAA deregulation) market for commercial aviation, none of the existing carriers have the vision or money to try it. It requires a HUGE investment for a relatively small immediate return. That's not a particularly easy sell to most boards in the current climate.