Turkish Airlines Plans To Begin Detroit Flights This November

Turkish Airlines will begin flying to Detroit from its base in Istanbul Airport with three weekly flights expected to start on November 15th and four from December. It disclosed plans for the route in November 2021. When writing this article on June 11th, no further details are known, but that will change soon.

Turkish Airlines to Detroit

Long anticipated, Detroit seems an obvious choice for Turkish Airlines. Yes, it is not a Star Alliance hub, but the metro population has a significant Levant population, which Royal Jordanian has served for many years. Turkish is well-placed geographically to capitalize on this traffic, including passengers from Lebanon, Jordan, and Israel, the most important markets.

It will also target the broader Middle East, with Iraq especially critical: it is the secondlargest immigrant group in Detroit's metro area. Other vital targets include the Balkans, notably Albania, with Turkish offering minimal backtracking and high frequencies. Then there is North Africa, with Egypt key.

In South Asia, Bangladesh will be important: Detroit has one of the highest Bangladeshi-US populations. Obviously, India is the largest country market of all relevant nations Turkish could target. However, given Turkish's minimal India network (it only serves Delhi and Mumbai with its own metal, with partner IndiGo serving them too) it won't be too reliant on it.

It is worth looking at Detroit's most popular point-to-point markets by passenger traffic (excluding Western Europe, the Far East, etc.), whether Turkish serves them or not. They are as follows, based on pre-pandemic 2019 numbers.

Beirut: 40,000 roundtrip passengers

Mumbai: 24,000

Amman: 23,000

Tel Aviv: 22,000

Delhi: 20,000

Bengaluru: 17,000 (unserved by TK's own metal)

Chennai: 16,000 (unserved by TK's own metal)

Hyderabad: 15,000 (unserved by TK's own metal)

Tirana: 14,000

Cairo: 12,000

Dubai: 12,000