Hi Javier
From your query plans I see the following:
Plan 1: 2012-11-07 00:00:00.000 <= ARRIVAL_TIME <= 2012-11-20 00:00:00.000 ASC : 0.000000542% Statistics | Bounded
Plan 2: C.ARRIVAL_TIME >= 2012-11-07 00:00:00.000 : 2.1566% Statistics
What is the actual selectivity of both conditions? Is the estimation is accurate enough, as compared to reality? If not - creation of a histogram on the column (CREATE STATISTICS statement) may help.
I understand the technical difficulties, but uploading of detailed saplan files generated in "Detailed and Node Statistics" mode, even to an external site, will really help to understand your query plans better.
Hope it helps
Leonid Gvirtz
