Originally Posted by
747 forever
Looks like business is more important than the environment, well there will be the day were the government gives limits to how much planes are operated and that is when the big birds come in handy.
Government will limit carbon emissions per seat-mile or lb(freight)-mile. As others have said repeatedly, it is not efficient to use a 500 passenger airplane on a route with only 50 passengers. Your suggestion to fly it once a week would never work, either--I don't want to fly from Indianapolis to Seattle and then wait in the airport for 4 days to catch a flight to Fairbanks on an A380. I could drive there in that time if I drank enough Red Bull.
Another reason: airplanes are extremely expensive and they don't make money by sitting on the ramp. If you're paying $100,000 a month for an airplane lease, do you want it to earn you money 4 times a month or 4 times a day?