UK carrier bmi regional is further boosting its offering from Bristol Airport with the introduction of three new routes in summer 2015. The new flights to Düsseldorf, Nantes and Paris bring the number of routes served by the carrier from Bristol to eight, alongside existing links to Aberdeen, Hamburg, Munich, Frankfurt and Milan.
These new flights will strengthen links to key markets in France and Germany for business and leisure passengers in the South West of England, further enhance the airline’s growing base at Bristol Airport and at the same time providing passengers with a convenient local alternative to the London airports.
The Bristol-Paris link will launch from April 27, 2015 and will operate six days a week with two flights a day Monday to Friday, and one flight on Sunday. The Bristol-Düsseldorf service will launch from the same date and will operate six times a weekly with flight from Sunday through Friday.
“The double-daily weekday service to the French capital’s major airport, Paris Charles de Gaulle, adds capacity to another major global hub and makes a same day return possible for business passengers,” said Robert Sinclair, chief executive officer, Bristol Airport.
The Bristol – Nantes route will launch from July 4, 2015 and will operate on a twice weekly basis during the summer only targeting mainly leisure demand. The city is the gateway to the Loire region, and popular for a weekend break, or a holiday among the world famous vineyards and chateaux.
The routes to Paris and Düsseldorf means businesses across the South West of England and beyond will have better connections to two of its most important trade markets. In the region there are more than 5,000 companies who are interested in or already exporting to France and Germany.
With bmi regional flying twice a day to Paris business travellers can have a full day of business in the French capital, rather than having to overnight. Düsseldorf is the centre of the Rhine-Ruhr and an international business and financial centre, renowned for its fashion and trade fairs, and bmi regional the only airline to connect Bristol to the capital of North Rhine-Westphalia.
“With Bristol as 2015 European Green Capital, the international spotlight is increasingly on us and we very much welcome this investment by bmi regional giving us links to these European cities,” said James Durie, executive director of Bristol Chamber of Commerce at Business West. “These new links will help stimulate our visitor economy and other investment into Bristol and the South West.”
All three routes will be served with 49-seat Embraer ERJ-145 equipment, except for one of the Nantes rotations which will be flown with a smaller 37-seat ERJ-135.
The expansion at Bristol is part of an expanded offering for summer 2015 which will also see the carrier establish a base in Munich, an important hub airport for Lufthansa. From March 29, 2015 it will introduce flights to Berne, Liege and Rotterdam in partnership with the German flag carrier, adding to its established link from the Bavarian capital from Bristol.
Further deepening its partnership with Lufthansa, bmi regional will also launch a twice daily weekday link between Jönköping in Sweden and Frankfurt under a codeshare with the German flag carrier. The flights commence from March 1, 2015 and will enable passengers to connect via the wider Lufthansa network via Frankfurt, opening up new direct flight options from the regional Swedish city. They will be operated by a 49-seat Embraer ERJ-145.
“The launch of this new route from Jönköping to Frankfurt and the rest of the world through our Lufthansa partnership strengthens both airlines’ network presence in Sweden and opens up new destinations for corporate and leisure travellers in Jönköping,” said Cathal O’Connell, chief executive officer, bmi regional.
In the chart, below, we highlight the growth in capacity from the airline’s ten largest points and how the new destinations of Jönköping and Rotterdam will play an important role in its network. According to published schedules, bmi regional has boosted network capacity by 50.8 per cent, with the new Munich operation a prime driver of this expansion.
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