Eastern Airlines: the South American Route System, August 1982

A dreamy, pencil-sketch styled route Map from the pre-digital era adorned the back section of Eastern Airlines in-flight magazine in August 1982. This excerpt detailed the airline's famed Latin American Routes, which fanned out from New York and Miami, following a predominant Andean spine, with busy interconnections between bases in Panama City, Bogota, Quito, Guayaquil, and Lima, thinning out toward Santiago and Buenos Aires. Astonishingly, there were apparently no routes to Venezuela, or to the huge cities of Brazil. The route map shows connections through Miami to Washington, Houston and Los Angeles, and a single non-stop from New Orleans to Panama City. 

LAN to Colombia, 2013

LAN, originally a Chilean carrier, has now become the dominant airline of all of the Latin America. This web ad markets its Colombian Division, with daily flight to Bogota. Clicking the link takes you to a dedicated section of the website, showing convenient connections from Miami to twenty Colombian cities via Bogota, including Barranquilla, Cali, Medellin, and others:

TACA: The Lima Hub, 2011

No corner of the globe has undergone such a radical re-alignment of aviation interests than Latin America, in which all but a handful of state carriers and private operators (not least including VIASA, VASP, Transbrasil, VARIG, Lloyd Aero Boliviano, Ladeco, Ecuatoriana, Aviateca, NICA, and Sahsa) have disappeared. In addition to the asphyxiatingly ubiquitous LAN Group, and a variety of promising mainline start-ups and a plethora of low-cost ventures, South America is now territory covered by Grupo TACA, through its 1999 merger with Avianca.

That marriage included the rebranding of a unit based at Lima, formerly known as TransAm but now operating as TACA Peru, with Avianca as a 49% shareholder. The division serves ten major cities from Santiago to Santa Cruz to Sao Paulo, and connects northwards to TACA's hubs in Central America as well as Mexico City and Miami.