p24 Air apr17 14/4/09 12:26 Page 24
Air
Chris Gray
020 7921 8003
cgray@ttglive.com
For the latest news about flights, airlines and airports, visit ttglive.com/air
EasyJet riled by
Luton £1 park fee
EASYJET has condemned a decision by its UK
base airport Luton to impose a £1 charge on
motorists dropping off passengers.
Drivers’ time in the zone will be limited to 10
minutes and the charge will be enforced by
barriers that will take payments as drivers leave.
Luton was strongly criticised by airlines, in-
cluding easyJet and Monarch, for its handling of
the snow in February. It has also been criticised
for introducing a £3 charge for passengers to
fast-track security and £1 to use luggage trolleys.
The latest move further angered easyJet. It said
it would cause traffic chaos by provoking people
to park on double yellow lines or in a bus lane.
Swiss places order
“Passengers already pay to use the airport
facilities as part of their air fare,” said a
spokesman. “The danger is that people will choose
for ‘green’ aircraft
other airports, rather than pay these charges.”
An airport spokesman said the drop-off zone
had been improved and drivers who did not want
Chris Gray.
(pictured) said the onboard product
to pay the £1 fee could use a mid-term car park, SWISS International Air Lines is to would also be improved, as the CSeries
which was about five minutes’ bus ride away. start flying one of the newest and aircraft, which seat between 110
most fuel-efficient aircraft in the world and 149 passengers, would be more
on its UK routes. spacious than the Avro fleet.
The airline has placed a £625 million From August, Swiss is also replacing
order for 20 Bombardier CSeries its A330-200s with A330-300s. These
aircraft , which will use about 25% less fuel than will have a first class cabin added to the business
its present Avro RJ100 short-haul fleet. and economy classes on its existing aircraft. The
Made of 70% composite material, the CSeries new aircraft will be introduced first on New York
is much lighter than similar aircraft and Bom- routes and then on all long-haul services.
bardier says it cuts operating costs by 15%, car- Koncilja said Swiss was visiting up to 3,000
bon dioxide emissions by 20% and noise by 75%. UK agents to tell them about the long-haul
The aircraft will be used on Swiss’s routes at improvements. He added that Swiss planned to
London City, Manchester, Birmingham and Dublin boost its market share from UK regional airports
from 2014, and the airline estimates it will save as carriers such as British Airways cut capacity.
90,000 tonnes of CO
2
emissions, the equivalent However, he admitted traffic transferring
of 7,000 flights between London and Zurich. through Swiss’s Zurich hub was down, as were
Swiss UK country manager Gregor Koncilja point-to-point passenger numbers.
Monarch to pull
and will sell tickets only on its monarch.co.uk
website, via its sister company, flight-only oper-
UNIFORM BEHAVIOUR: Thomson Airways ator Avro on avroagents.com, and via XML links.
has unveiled a new uniform for the airline, fares off GDSs The airline said agents booking through Avro
formed from the merger of Thomsonfly had to pay only a deposit at the time of booking
and First Choice Airways. The inflight MONARCH Airlines is withdrawing all its flights and also benefited from commissionable fares.
product, onboard retail and catering will from global distribution systems from the end Liz Savage, managing director of Monarch’s
be integrated from May 1. The final stage of April after reporting a “huge” drop in the scheduled services division, said: “We have seen
of the merger will be a rebranding of the number of agents using the systems. a huge fall in direct GDS sales, largely due to
65-strong fleet over the next few years. It is leaving Amadeus and Galileo on April 30 agents using other methods to access our fares.”
24 17.04.2009
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