New routes launched during the last week
(Saturday 18 April – Friday 24 April):

Route of the week:
Aer Lingus’ London Gatwick to Munich

Her Royal Highness, Queen Elizabeth II launches the new Gatwick-Munich service for Aer Lingus (Ireland of course does not have a Head of State chosen by God). Aer Lingus has been awarded route of the week for developments at Gatwick – including Nice and Vienna this week, with Faro and Zurich following on April 26th.

• Aer Lingus has started three more routes from its new base at London Gatwick (LGW). It has started twice-daily services to Munich (MUC) and Nice (NCE), and daily services to Vienna (VIE). The Nice route has been served by easyJet since July 2001 while easyJet also recently began daily flights to Munich and Vienna from Gatwick. Although easyJet started operating the routes before Aer Lingus they were announced after Aer Lingus had revealed its Gatwick plans suggesting the decision was taken in response to the Irish airline’s temerity in establishing a significant presence at easyJet’s biggest operating base.

Cake of the week:
United’s Washington Dulles to Geneva

Geneva airport pulled out all the stops for United airlines’ arrival from Washington Dulles, with a lavish cake, welcome baptism and ribbon cutting. Pictured here among the decorations: Robert Deillon, (CEO Geneva Airport), Scott Dolan, (Senior VP, United Airlines), Leigh Carter, (Chargé d’Affaires, United States Embassy in Switzerland) and François Longchamp, (minister Canton of Geneva).

• United launched daily non-stop flights from Washington Dulles (IAD) to Geneva (GVA) this week using a 767-300. “Our service to Geneva provides our customers with convenient access to international business, financial and diplomatic centres.” said Kevin Knight, the airline’s senior VP of Planning. “We will continue to adjust our capacity to market conditions and seek new opportunities to serve markets that respond to our customers’ needs and deliver the results necessary to return us to profitability.” Geneva has two other non-stop services to the USA as Continental operates daily to New York Newark and Swiss operates a daily service to New York JFK.

• AeroMexico is now flying between Mexico City (MEX) and Nuevo Laredo (NLD). Service is provided twice-daily using an Embraer ERJ145. Local rival Mexicana currently offers 13 weekly flights between the two cities. According to Mexican government statistics some 77,000 passengers were carried on the route in 2008

A water archway salutes Air Arabia’s arrival into Athens airport from its Sharjah hub, followed by a ribbon ‘bonding’. AK Nizar, head of commercial department, Air Arabia, said: “Greece is one of the fastest growing economies in the EU, and there is considerable passenger traffic between the country and the Middle East, particularly for tourism and business.”

• Air Arabia now flies to mainland Europe. This week it began thrice-weekly flights from Sharjah (SHJ) to Athens (ATH). Sharjah is a new destination for Athens airport. This opens up the possibility of flying from London to Sydney only on low-cost airlines. One possible routing would be starting at London Luton and flying to Athens with easyJet. Then fly with Air Arabia to Sharjah and connect with Air Arabia on to Bangalore. From Bangalore take Tiger Airways to Singapore and then use JetStar to get to Perth before finally catching a Virgin Blue flight to Sydney. Anna.aero has not worked out how long this would take (or typically cost) but if any of our readers would like to calculate it (or find a better / more interesting routing) we would love to hear from you. Just add a comment at the end of this news section.

From London city to the surfing city: Air Southwest’s new twice-daily services (weekdays and Saturdays and once on Sundays) to Newquay and Plymouth will enable holiday makers to take advantage of flights out of the Capital.	Kevin Pickup, Newquay’s senior marketing officer told anna.aero: “This is the Cornish perception of how life in the big smoke must be! Air Southwest is looking at the Newquay route as a good outbound business service.”

• Air Southwest has begun flights to London City (LCY) from Plymouth (PLH) and Newquay (NQY). Flights will operate twice daily on weekdays complemented by a single Sunday service. Peter Davies, managing director of Air Southwest, said: “This London City service will revolutionise air travel between Devon and Cornwall and the capital. We expect it to be hugely popular with business travellers and have timed the flights to fit with busy working lives. Day-return rail travel to the capital is costly and time-consuming. With our new London City service our customers will save hours of travelling time, with great value fares. It’s also ideal for a short-break in London, and will help to increase inbound tourism to both Devon and Cornwall.” Flights will operate from Newquay via Plymouth to London City using the airline’s Dash 8s.

• Air Transat has introduced thrice-weekly flights from Toronto (YYZ) to Rome Fiumicino (FCO). Competition during the summer months will be provided by both Air Canada and Alitalia.

• airberlin (or should that still be Air Berlin) has launched two new routes to Scandinavia. Oslo (OSL) will now be served every weekday from Berlin Tegel (TXL) while Stockholm Arlanda will also be served five-times weekly from Hannover (HAJ). The only existing services between Oslo and Berlin are provided by Norwegian who operates almost daily to Berlin SXF. There are no direct scheduled services at present between Stockholm and Hannover.

• easyJet further consolidates its position as the biggest airline at London Gatwick (LGW) with the introduction this week of flights to Bodrum (BJV) in Turkey. Services will operate thrice-weekly on Monday, Thursday and Saturday. Bodrum is a new destination for easyJet and its third in Turkey after Istanbul and Dalaman. In 2008 passenger numbers at Bodrum airport rose by 6.7% to 2.75 million.

At Cardiff, Jonathan Hinkles, Loganair’s commercial director and Patrick Duffy, managing director, Cardiff airport serve up Aberdeen angus burgers for departing passengers. It’s Flybe and Loganair’s ninth service from Aberdeen, with competitive fares starting from £44.99 one way, including taxes.

• Flybe’s franchise partner Loganair has started direct flights between Cardiff (CWL) and Aberdeen (ABZ). Flights will operate daily (except Saturday) using a Saab 340. David Harrison, Chief Executive of Loganair, said: “We are delighted to announce the new service between Aberdeen and Cardiff. Our research has identified strong demand for these flights. We’re confident that our competitive fares, starting at £44.99 one-way including all taxes, will prove highly attractive to both business and leisure travellers who have, up to now, been forced to make difficult journeys at high prices to travel between the two cities.”

Dubai celebrates the arrival of Jet Airways from Chennai (yesterday). Pictured here: Saood Abdul Aziz Kangazar, general manager Dubai civil aviation, Mohammed bin Gahim, (general manager DXB Airports), Ian Andrew, (divisional sr. vice president, DNATA), along with Abraham Joseph (sr. general manager, Jet Airways), Shakir Kantawala, (general manager – Dubai and Northern Emirates) and captain and co-pilot (of the inaugural flight). Jet Airways also operates daily flights to Kuwait, Bahrain, Muscat, Doha and Abu Dhabi in the Gulf from several Indian cities.

• Jet Airways has inaugurated daily flights from Chennai (MAA) to Dubai (DXB). According to Wolfgang Prock-Schauer, CEO, Jet Airways, “Jet Airways is fast emerging as the carrier of choice on the Indo-Dubai sector, on account of the warmth of its service, its world-class in-flight product and unmatched pan-India connectivity. The new services will enable the carrier to further enhance its presence on the sector, in line with passenger demand.” The airline will be competing head-to-head with Emirates who operate 17 weekly departures, and Indian Airlines which flies the route daily.

Lufthansa now serves Venice and St Petersburg from Dusseldorf, with daily flights competing head-to-head with airberlin.

70s retro: Meanwhile, Venice just celebrated the 30-year anniversary of Lufthansa operations here. “Romeo X-ray” – an A321 painted in the carrier’s original livery served as a fitting backdrop to the historic event.

• Lufthansa has added two new destinations from Dűsseldorf (DUS) as it continues its battle with airberlin at the airport. New daily flights to Venice (VCE) and St Petersburg (LED) began this week using CRJ700s. airberlin will start both of these routes next week, while on the St Petersburg route there is further competition from Rossiya.

• Malev has also added a new route to St Petersburg (LED) from its home base in Budapest (BUD). Flights will operate twice-weekly until 21 October. This becomes Malev’s third route to Russia after Moscow Sheremetyevo and Yekaterinburg.

• More bad news for SAS. Norwegian began two new routes from Stockholm Arlanda (ARN) this week. Budapest (BUD) will be served thrice-weekly as will Rome Fiumicino (FCO) initially, though an additional frequency will be added on this route from 7 June. The Budapest route is already served by Malev (12 weekly departures) and SAS (two weekly departures), while Rome is served four times weekly by SAS.

• Ryanair has started serving Toulon (TLN) in southern France from its base at Stockholm Skavsta (NYO). Flights operate twice-weekly on Tuesdays and Saturdays. Last year Toulon handled around 629,000 passengers. This summer Ryanair will also serve Toulon from London Stansted and Bristol (starting in July).

• Transavia.com started another three routes from Copenhagen (CPH) this week. Services to Chania (CHQ) in Crete, Naples (NAP) in Italy and Palma de Mallorca (PMI) in Spain will operate at various frequencies during the summer months. This summer Transavia.com will serve 11 destinations from Copenhagen, one more than during the recent winter season. Seasonal winter routes to Innsbruck, Gran Canaria, Salzburg and Tenerife Sur have been replaced by these three latest summer sun routes plus Montpellier and Pisa which start next month.

• US Airways has resumed daily seasonal flights between Charlotte (CLT) and Paris CDG (CDG) after a seven year gap. Flights will be operated by a 767 configured with 18 seats in Envoy class and 186 seats in economy. Paris joins Frankfurt and London Gatwick as European destinations served non-stop by US Airways from Charlotte. Additionally, Lufthansa also serves Munich with daily flights.

The Route Recycle Bin

To see the latest information we have on routes that have recently been dropped or soon will be, check out our unique downloadable Route Recycle Bin spreadsheet. We currently have over 900 routes in our database which may be of interest to carriers.