Emirates Airline's service from Newcastle to Dubai has for a long-time been hailed as a game-changer for North East England, not just affording better access into markets across the Middle East and into Asia and the Pacific via Dubai International Airport, but also due to the more than 14,000 tonnes of cargo its Airbus A330-200s and Boeing 777-300ERs have carried since it launched the route in 2007.
In 2008, Avinor adopted a goal of reaching the 70 percent public transportation share in the ground transport service to Oslo Airport in 2020, but has now achieved this five years ahead of schedule, survey data from 2015 has shown. It remains on-track to to achieve a 75 percent public transportation share by 2030.
The expanded summer 2017 offer will see new weekly flights to Faro, Malta and Naples and expanded services to Arrecife, Bourgas, Fueteventura, Ibiza, Larnaca, Mahon, Paphos and Zante. This will follow the debut of new routes to Hurghada and Las Palmas and frequency growth to Arrecife, Banjul and Tenerife in the winter 2016/2017 schedule, the latter seeing growth from one to four weekly flights for the full season.
Although BA can take ownership of these scarce resources over time, it is obliged to make them available to competitors in specific domestic markets. Although Flybe remained tight-lipped about any plan, chief executive Saad Hamaad is understood to believe smaller aircraft could help a Heathrow operation to succeed.
Routes Europe kicked-off in style yesterday with an engaging and thought-provoking Strategy Summit that debated some of the key topics impacting the aviation business across the region. Here's a round up of day one's activities.
At this year’s Routes Europe in KrakówPoland the power of event networking this was highlighted better than ever when a new air link was tentatively agreed during the short coach journey from the EXPO Kraków International Exhibition and Convention Centre and last night’s Welcome Reception at the Stara Zajezdnia Kraków by DeSilva.
The forthcoming UK Brexit vote should be used by the European Union (EU) as an opportunity to have an entire rethink over the political bloc’s problems. Speaking at the Routes Europe 2016 Strategy Summit, in Kraków, Poland, LOT Polish Airlines CEO Rafal Milczarski said he believed the UK’s voters will decide to stay in the EU on June 23. However, even if the decision is made to keep things the same, he urged Brussels not to treat it as a vindication of the current set up.
Regional airlines could face a five-year period of consolidation as they are out-muscled by bigger rivals. Speaking at the Route Europe 2016 Strategy Summit in Kraków, Poland, Iberia Regional/Air Nostrum network planning and scheduling director Miguel Oliver said in the last 20 years in Spain, the country has lost 20 carriers.
Speaking in a session on regional carrier trends in Europe, bmi regional's chief commercial officer, Jochen Schnadt, said that bmi regional is seeing the potential to grow capacity in some of its existing markets and opportunities for larger equipment for new route development.
Ryanair first introduced flights into Prague in November 2007 and currently offers at least daily flights from Brussels Charleroi, Dublin and London Stansted. The launch of the base will support the introduction of new daily flights to Bergamo and Rome in Italy and will boost annual capacity by around 100,000 to 625,000 seats.
The weekly flight from Toulouse to Oujda will operate every Monday for a three month period from late June until late September and will be scheduled around the daytime period an aircraft would otherwise be sat idle at the southern French airfield after fulfilling its morning Airbus staff shuttle commitment.
The airline launched the route on April 18, 2016 and is operating three flights a week between the two capitals using a 138-seat Airbus A319 aircraft in a dual business and economy class configuration. This summer a fourth weekly flight will also operate between June 22, 2016 and August 10, 2016.
The Asian-Budapest market last year experienced an impressive 20 percent increase, with the number of Korean visitors alone increasing by ten percent, having tripled over the last five years.
Any new company would retain the Virgin brand but be run at a lower cost as a different corporate entity with different employee contracts. It could operate with a small fleet of twin-engined widebody equipment transferred across from Delta’s mainline fleet to help lower its operating costs if the go-ahead is given.
The European flag carrier, the launch customer for the Bombardier C Series will place its first CS100 into service on flight LX638 from Zurich to Paris Charles de Gaulle on July 15, 2016 before introducing the type across a number of European markets.
Although the Air France-KLM Group low-cost brand has previously served the UK market from the Netherlands, the new links from Paris Orly into England and Scotland’s capital cities by its Transavia France operation represent its first ever flights between France and the UK.
Before the meetings took place at Routes Europe 2016 in Krakow, the Messis and Ronaldos of the aviation world took to the pitch for a charity football tournament. The tournament was sponsored by The Best of France, and it took place at the University of Economics.
The southern Ireland regional facility now has a network of more than 50 routes with nine new routes taking off this year including Düsseldorf with Aer Lingus, London City, Nantes and La Rochelle with CityJet, Madrid with Iberia Express, Cardiff with Flybe, Southampton and Leeds Bradford with Aer Lingus Regional as well as Menorca with Lee Travel and Stein Travel.
Latest figures from VisitBritain state that tourist numbers to the UK from China were up 37 percent in the first nine months of 2015 as more than 200,000 Chinese holidaymakers visited the UK in the nine month period. VisitBritain is hoping to double spending from Chinese visitors to £1 billion by 2020, - they were already among the highest spenders ringing up £2,688 a head and already account for almost a quarter of tourist spending in the UK.
The Chinese city will become Iberia’s first Asian destination ahead of its previously announced launch of flights to Tokyo from October 18, 2016. This year the Spanish airline is also resuming services to Puerto Rico (from May 15, 2016) and to Johannesburg (from August 1, 2016), while its seasonal flights to Boston, previously offered from March to October, will operate through December this year.
Dublin Airport officials are working closely with airline partners to build Dublin Airport as a gateway and a significant growth in transatlantic capacity in particular is helping to provide significant transfer opportunities.
OpenSkies revealed earlier this month that the 767-300 would join its existing 757-200s from August 2016. Our Airline Route blog now confirms that schedules have been updated to include the new arrival with a first scheduled flight of the type due on August 19, 2016.
The new connection will be the only direct flight between London Gatwick and Bucharest and will grow Wizz Air’s daily flights between the two cities to four, complementing its existing three times daily link from London Luton, a route that was introduced almost ten years ago in January 2007.
This marks the return of the two routes after a four year absence and will be the only direct long-haul services to be offered from Bristol Airport. The move is part of the holiday company’s strategy to ensure customers across its home UK market can fly more easily from their local airports.
The new flight will bring a significant number of additional one-stop connection opportunities from Košice International Airport via Istanbul’s Atatürk Airport. Although the flight is initially launching on a three times weekly basis as the carrier tests the market, it is its ambition to grow frequencies in future schedules, as has been the case with many of the new markets it has introduced over the past few years.
