Simple Flying recently reported on the massive renovation of Terminal 1 at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport (MSP) and how it is running two months ahead of schedule. A partnership between the Metropolitan Airports Commission (which owns and operates MSP) and Delta Air Lines, the project began in 2023 and is the largest-ever renovation conducted at Terminal 1 and will deliver a unified and modern design across six of the terminal’s seven concourses and approximately 75 Delta gates.
Photo: Deyan Georgiev | Shutterstock
This is a significant upgrade for Delta, allowing it to offer new international services from the facility and boosting capacity for domestic services. We recently looked at the leading international routes from MSP, so this article will focus on the top 5 domestic routes.
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Serving the twin cities of Minneapolis and Saint Paul, this airport is a busy Delta hub.
First, a little background to MSP
Situated 10 miles from downtown Minneapolis and Saint Paul, MSP started life as Twin City Speedway race track but was converted into Speedway Field from 1919 onwards. Passenger services began in 1929, and today, MSP is the busiest airport in the upper Midwest and serves approximately 35 million passengers a year.
Photo: Wirestock Creators | Shutterstock
MSP has two terminals that sit a mile apart on the airfield:
- Terminal 1: Also known as the Lindbergh Terminal, after Minnesota’s most famous aviator, it primarily serves legacy US carriers and international airlines. It has 117 gates across seven concourses (A-G).
- Terminal 2: Also known as the Humphrey Terminal after Vice President Hubert Humphrey, it has just 14 gates and is home to predominantly low-cost carriers, including Sun Country Airlines, which is based as MSP
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MSP has also been an award-winning airport recently, cited by Cirium as the most punctual airport in the world and by JD Power as the US airport with the highest passenger satisfaction. MSP is also Delta’s second-largest hub after its home base of Atlanta, with 550 daily arrivals and departures. To examine its leading domestic routes, we analyzed data from Cirium, an aviation analytics company, for Delta’s October traffic at MSP, and these are the top five domestic routes by seat availability.
Photo: Lukas Souza | Simple Flying
5
Phoenix (PHX)
340 flights | 62,476 seats
While Phoenix is an American Airlines hub, Delta has sufficient traffic passing through MSP to justify 10-12 daily flights on the MSP-PHX route. It utilizes a mix of its Boeing 737-900 aircraft, of which it has 163 in the fleet with an average age of 8.8 years, and its slightly younger Airbus A321-200s, of which it has 127 in the fleet with an average age of 5.8 years.
Photo: Markus Mainka | Shutterstock
The MSP-PHX is the busiest domestic route for Phoenix in terms of the number of airlines because, aside from Delta, the following airlines are also on the route:
- American Airlines: Twice daily flights using B737-800s
- Sun Country Airlines: 2–4 times daily, using B737-800s
- Southwest Airlines: Daily flight with a B737 MAX 8
- Frontier Airlines: Three times a week with an A320neo
4
Boston (BOS)
352 flights | 67,232 seats
Delta will offer marginally more seats in October to its second Northeast hub, Boston Logan International. On weekdays, it offers 12 daily flights in both directions, dropping to 8 daily flights on weekends, all served by its A321-200 fleet. Notably, the timing of the departures from MSP to BOS is set up to connect to the growing number of transatlantic flights that Delta is adding to Boston.
Photo: Delta Air Lines
Delta faces very little competition on this route. While BOS is a focus city for JetBlue, it flies only a single return Embraer E190 service on the route, which is set to be suspended before the end of the month, and Sun Country offers a single return B737-800 service between the two cities.
3
Las Vegas (LAS)
392 flights | 72,980 seats
Las Vegas’ Harry Reid International Airport is the eighth-busiest airport in the US and welcomes nearly 600,000 passengers a year from MSP. Delta has 14 daily flights in both directions on the MSP-LAS route, served predominantly by its A321-200 fleet (10 flights daily), but with its B737-900s accounting for four daily flights.
Photo: Las Vegas International Airport
Delta’s competition on the route is entirely from low-cost carriers:
- Sun Country Airlines: 4 flights daily, using B737-800s
- Southwest Airlines: A daily return flight utilizing a mix of B737-700, -800s, and MAX 8s on the route.
- Spirit Airlines: A return flight six times a week utilizing an A320neo
2
Los Angeles (LAX)
410 flights | 77,580 seats
The nation’s second-largest city is also the second-largest destination from Delta from MSP, with over 400 flights to this west coast Delta hub in October. Interestingly, while Delta predominantly utilizes its A321-200s and B737-900s on this route, it has also started introducing its new A321neos, which only entered service with the airline in 2022, on the MSP-LAX route.
Photo: Markus Mainka | Shutterstock
LAX is also a hub for American, United, and Alaska Airlines, but Delta’s dominance is why none of these legacy carriers fly to MSP from LAX. Sun Country is the only carrier competing with Delta on the MSP-LAX route, which has two return flights a day with its B737-800s.
1
Atlanta (ATL)
530 flights | 105,256 seats
Unsurprisingly, Delta’s top domestic destination from MSP is its mega-hub in Atlanta. The shortest of its most popular routes from MSP at just over 900 miles, Delta has a minimum of 16 flights daily between MSP and ATL, rising to 20 daily flights on its busiest days. This dwarfs its competitors on the route: Frontier (4 times a week with an A320neo) and Spirit (daily return service with an A321).
Delta utilizes a variety of aircraft on the MSP-ATL route, including its B737-900s, A321-200s, and its aging but beloved B757-200s. But most interestingly, this is one of the routes where you can still fly on the larger 234-seat Boeing 757-300s, often called the ‘flying pencil.’ Delta still has 16 of the type in its fleet, and once Icelandair retires its examples later this month, Delta will be one of only 3 airlines (along with United and Condor) where you can fly the B757-300.