A question for anyone familiar with St Louis airport

[Poohlovr]

Our flight has a layover (if you want to call it that ) of 25 min in St Louis.

We've already changed our plans about using a carseat for our grandson (he'll be 27 months old when we fly) to save time getting off of plane #1 and onto plane #2. We'll check it with the luggage, instead. As for his stroller, I guess we'll just buy a new one in Orlando, so that we don't have to fool with that changing planes.

My question is-is this layover realistic? What are our chances of actually making it onto the second plane? I know if our first flight is late, we're probably screwed.

This is with Southwest, if that makes a difference.

 

[Horace Horsecollar]

Airlines have rules for "legal connection" times -- the minimum length in minutes that the airline thinks will work and for which they sell connecting tickets. Usually there's a different "legal connection" time for a connection on the same airline vs. one that involves change of airlines. The times vary by airport and airline.

Check with your airline if 25 minutes is a "legal connection."

Flights begin boarding 30 minutes before scheduled departure. So your first leg is not even scheduled to arrive until your second leg is already boarding. Then you still have to get off the airplane at one gate and head to another.

That said, if your first flight departs your home airport on time, 25 minutes should be doable at Lambert-St. Louis International Airport, if the airline considers it a legal connection. In fact, if the flight departs on time, you may arrive at Lambert up to 20 minutes early. Airlines build fudge factors into their schedules, especially for flights that are chronically delayed.

However, if your first segment has even a modest delay for any reason, you're likely to miss your connection (unless the second leg is delayed too). At that point, the "legal connection" time doesn't matter. The airline will get you to your destination -- eventually.

I try to avoid connections of less that 60 minutes anywhere, and I prefer at least 90 minutes. I'd rather have the mild inconvenience of enough time for lunch at the connecting airport than the real inconvenience of missing a connection and being putting into middle seats (if the airline has pre-assigned seats) on a flight 6 hours later. Even 90 minutes does not guarantee a successful connection, but it greatly increases the chance.

 

[Horace Horsecollar]

I just noticed that you're flying Southwest. I would trust Southwest with tight connections more than other airlines.

Does your flight have one flight number or two? In addition to connections (two flight numbers) Southwest operates flights with that simply make intermediate stops (one flight number). Passengers going to the same destination as the airplane stay on the plane.

 

[Anjelica]

If it helps - my experience with years of flying in/out of Lambert both Main and East Terminal (if you are flying SW you will be flying into the East Terminal) is that flights are generally ontime and many if not most of the time early. Lambert is not what it used to be back when TWA was here in terms of traffic.

A 25 minute flight might be cutting it close if you were not flying on the same airline but flying into the East Terminal on SW will most likely NOT be an issue at all.

 

[Jestocost]

Barring any delays on your first flight you should make your connection. However, if you do arrive as scheduled and head straight to your second flight without stopping for the restroom, etc. you still may get to the gate after boarding has started. If it hasn't or they aren't to your number yet, no issues. But if they have started and your numbers already have boarded, for example, I'm not sure how they will handle you. I assume they won't make you wait until the end, but if you have group 'A' boarding numbers and they already are boarding group 'B,' I don't know if they'll let you cut in front of the Bs that haven't boarded already or make you wait until the end of the B group. I'm guessing that there's gate agent discretion in that.

 

[Poohlovr]

Thanks for all of your help.

We have 2 flight numbers and it specifically says "change of planes".

I bought the early bird boarding passes (thinking that we would be using the car seat) so I'm really going to be upset if we have problems being seated together.

 

[NotUrsula]

Tell the Flight Attendant on your first flight that you have a very tight connection; they keep track of things like that and try to make sure that the FA's of the second plane are aware that you are on your way.

The East Terminal is very easy to navigate and you should be able to change planes quite quickly. At the very most, the distance you would have to go would be 15 gates.

Now as to the early bird seating, if the A's have already been seated when you reach the gate, then it *is* possible that you could have an issue, because they normally won't hold seats open for passengers who happened to have EBS BP's but didn't show for the A group. However, IME with SWA, if the FA has been notified that there is a young family party coming from a tight connection, they will save seats at the back of the aircraft to be sure that you are seated without delaying everyone else.

SWA's gates have boarding tunnel structures at STL; little closed hallways made out of cubicle panels that lead out of the jetway. Embarkation happens from the side of the tunnels, and debarcation happens via the end of the tunnels. If you reach the gate area and realize that the folks lined up are holding B's or C's (and you have A's), go around to the end of the tunnel and walk up to the GA that way to show your BP's; you will be allowed to cut into the boarding stream without having to run the gauntlet of the other boarding passengers.