[saosebastiao]

Hub and spoke models still dominate for all major carriers. True point to point routes, where neither the origin nor destination are hubs, are an extremely tiny minority of all routes flown. Some regional airlines (such as southwest) fly pseudo point to point, but really that is just spoke->hub->minihub->spoke and isn't feasible outside of the short routes that regional airlines make.

What has actually happened is that hubs became more numerous and smaller. A major airline might have 6 hubs instead of 2. And most long distance trips are done with 2 legs instead of 3.

[Retric]

There is a vast difference between 6 mini hubs and 2 major ones, especially when different airlines have different mini hubs. It’s a lowest hanging fruit change especially and airlines are trying to minimize hops which really makes a difference.

Remember, mini hubs are near major destinations so people are very likely to be starting or stopping at one, Combined with different airlines 1 hops vs 2 or 3 is common, but more so 2 hops vs 3 or 4.