A lot of budget Airlines (in Europe: Ryanair, EasyJet etc) try to cut costs of airport service and one way they do that is to accept bus transport or walk out to board.
this post was submitted on 24 Dec 2025
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Land availability. European cities have been occupied for way longer, so there is a lot lower chance of some huge unused space for a massive airport. Smaller airports are more likely to have you board/unboard on the tarmac. Denver airport is more than 10x the size of the biggest airport in all of Europe. It's also bigger than Zurich, the whole city is smaller than the Denver airport.
No way!? That's insane. Wow. Wow. Thanks for this fact
Denver is the second largest airport in the world after Dammam, Saudi Arabia, which doesn't even seem to use much of its enormous amount of land from a quick look.
Denver's airport is relatively new, was built way outside of town before the city really had a chance to grow into it, and is about twice the size of Manhattan.
I guess it really earns that murderhorse
Most American airports are space constrained, including many of the oldest ones in the country. The old airports in the US generally use jet bridges even when they are constrained by space.
Jet bridges are also an access control system. It’s harder to wander off to another part of the tarmac if you can’t get to it in the first place.
It’s also probably cheaper to guard too, since locked doors and alarms don’t require healthcare, and you can push that duty off to flight attendants and gate employees.
Maybe something to do with ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) compliance? Europe tolerates a lot less accessibility by necessity since they have so many older buildings, so maybe that translates over into having more tolerance for stairs when boarding planes?
"Europe" has different laws in different countries. The UK is incredibly keen on accessibility, but Germany is ablist as hell, for instance.
Jet bridges only work with airplanes above a certain size, such as Boeing 737 and above. Airports that also serve smaller aircraft need to have infrastructure in place to board from the apron, and once that infrastructure is in place it can be used for both big and small aircraft.
Boarding from the apron is a lot more flexible as it's basically a matter of getting the aircraft onto any available parking spot, and then shuttle passengers to and from the aircraft. So delayed flights are more likely to use one of these spots, as the Jet bridge schedule requires a lot of planning.
While the above probably isn't a root cause, it's definitely a factor.
Source: Frequent flyer, on both big and small aircraft.
Nah, I worked at an airport that only has CRJs and we had a jet bridge. I've even boarded Saab 340s from them. There are some differences like a little bridge instead of direct connection, and they can't use the jet bridge's auto-level feature (as the plane gets loaded and unloaded it slowly sinks/rises not unlike what a car would do; auto-level has a stick with a wheel to track that and move the jet bridge to match) but other than that it's pretty seamless.
Ok, there is a limit and you probably couldn't use a jet bridge on, say, a Cessna Caravan... But the minimum is most definitely not a mainline plane.
How about a dash 8? They're pretty common around here, and I'm having a hard time imagining how one would connect a jet bridge to them.
I've only been on a Dash 8 a few times, but I think I've boarded one from a jet bridge once?
My local airport is exclusively serviced by DH Dash8, so it obviously doesn't have a jet bridge.
However, my regional airport (ENGM) has all sizes, and the smaller ones have their own area at the very end of terminal A so that passengers can walk to the smaller aircraft out of one out of 6 boarding gates, across clearly marked paths on the apron, and onto the smaller aircrafts.
I've taken jet bridges to board Embraer 175's in the USA. In contrast, I've gone up stairs for an Airbus A321 in Europe.
That's nothing, I have been deplaned to a bus from a bloody A380. Almost missed my connection. In Dubai.
All I can add is a personal anecdote but most of the smaller regional airports I have ever flown through have boarded from the tarmac vs a jet bridge.
Yeah, but I've taken the bus to the airplane at major airports in the EU including Frankfurt. In contrast, the airports in the US that I've had to board on stairs are much smaller.
Really depends on the airline. Lufthansa will rarely send you on a bus. But the answer is because they don't have enough gates for all the planes.
Oh yeah I’ve never taken a bus to the plane before
Until recently, La Guardia in NY, and Philly airports had pretty regular busses to commuter jets (Embrairs, Canadians, Bombardier, etc). Philly still busses between terminals. I think DCA does as well. Not sure about others. I used to go through LGA, PHL, & DCA pretty often. The CLT (have to include “the”) also has a lot of outdoor boarding from terminal E (the commuter terminal).
So, in the US, you see busses more in larger airports that are more land-constrained for terminal space. Beyond this, you’re getting into small regional airports when you see more outdoor boarding. As to why, it’s probably just in response to expectations of US air passengers.
Buses between terminals is a lot more common and I've even seen buses acting as airplanes in the USA.
I can see some US airports using bussing, but it feels like the practice is far more commonplace in the EU than the US. It is also odd given than EU airports appear to be newer on average to US airports.
buses acting as airplanes in the USA
I've heard of buses acting as trains (rail replacement service) but imagine being told your airplane is cancelled and you'll get a replacement bus service
seen buses acting as airplanes in the USA
Them Duke boys are at it again
I love that reference :)
This is a great question and I wanna know too. The first time I set foot on a tarmac was probably when I was 22, and I had flown dozens of times before then.
The reason for this is that a lot less people care about planes in Europe when you have an amazing high speed rail network that bankrupts Airlines all over the region.
I guess it's mainly for convenience. Americans demand much more convenience, and complain loudly about the smallest things.