The addition of the routes from Liège will expand the VLM network to nine destinations in six countries and will continue a recent growth in passenger operations at Liège Bierset Airport, which is better known as a major European freight hub.
Turkish airline, SunExpress has recently announced its plans for a total of 21 new routes for the summer 2015 season, with departures mainly from Antalya, Dalaman, Izmir and Konya.
The UK carrier is currently reinventing itself as a scheduled European low-cost operator following a change in ownership to better meet passenger demand. Through the review of its network strategy, the airline is focussing on offering customers greater flight frequency and more sociable departure times to short-haul European destinations from its main UK bases.
Helsinki Airport is set to welcome its long-awaited train connection this July, when the Ring Rail Line opens. The new rail line will provide a convenient connection between the airport and the city centre.
Thomas Cook Airlines will further expand its UK long-haul programme in summer 2016 building on the airline’s growing long-haul summer programme this year, which sees its first flights to New York and Miami from May 2015. Next year’s programme will see further growth at Manchester and more frequencies from Glasgow, London (both Gatwick and Stansted airports), Belfast and Cardiff.
Košice International Airport is among the fastest growing airports in Europe. It achieved a 50 per cent increase in passenger traffic in 2014 compared to the previous year, also recording its strongest charter season in its history, and a 13 per cent increase in aircraft movements for the year.
The expanded schedules for summer 2015 will see easyJet launch the route six weeks earlier than last year from May 14, 2015, offer a third weekly rotation in July and August and deploy a larger Airbus A320 on almost two thirds of the flights.
Visa on arrival policies in particular have become implemented in more areas, and this largely reflects an increased awareness among governments of the positive impacts of visa facilitation on tourism and economic growth.
The new flights from the Iraqi flag carrier will be the first non-stop scheduled links between Manchester and the country, although a previous charter series have linked the markets previously via a one-stop offering. Both routes will be flown using a new Boeing 737-800 configured with 162 seats.
The aircraft will be delivered to WOW air in mid-March in a single-class 200-seat configuration. They will enter into service on the airline’s new routes between Reykjavik and the United States, with flights to Boston beginning on March 27, 2015 and to Washington DC on May 8, 2015.
The ANA airport group which is responsible for the management of airports in Mainland Portugal including Lisbon, Porto, Faro and the Beja civilian terminal, as well as airports in the Azores and Madeira Autonomous Regions, recorded a growth of 9.5 percent in commercial passenger traffic in 2014 compared to the previous year.
According to the German flag carrier, following “close consultation with Austrian Airlines and at the carrier’s own request,” Eurowings will initially station two Airbus A320s at Vienna International Airport to offer point-to-point connections on European routes, but could grow the fleet and network in the coming years.
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 airline, part of the Silk Way Group, first introduced flights between Heydar Aliyev International Airport in Baku and Budapest in March 2014 but strong demand for goods in and out of the European market has seen it switch from the 53-tonne capacity 767-300F to the 113-tonne capacity 747-400Fs.
Mainly targeting leisure demand, Mistral Air will offer twice weekly flights on the two routes on a seasonal summer only basis. These flights will operate between April 28, 2015 and September 1, 2015 and will be operated using Boeing 737-300 equipment configured with 144 seats.
UK multinational pharmaceutical and biologics company AstraZeneca is understood to have reached an agreement with Danish carrier Sun-Air for the airline to introduce two rotations per day, four days per week between Cambridge and Gothenburg from the end of March this year.
Over a twelve-month period, preliminary data shows a growth rate of 5.1 percent year over year, with both international and domestic traffic posting strong growth rates of 5.8 percent and 4.5 percent respectively.
Greek start-up, SkyGreece will launch services to Canada, with new routes between Athens, Thessaloniki, Zagreb and Budapest to Toronto, following approval from the Greek and Canadian authorities.
Aena, which runs 46 Spanish airports, saw its shares rocket as high as 17 percent on the day the company listed on the Madrid stock market, in Spain’s biggest initial public offering (IPO) since 2007.
The airline, part of the Lufthansa Group, has been forced to cancel a number of its domestic and European short-haul routes as a result of the walkout by the Vereinigung Cockpit (VC) union which has failed to reach an agreement on working contracts for its members with the Lufthansa Group.
In partnership with our Airline Route blog, Routesonline is launching a new weekly 'Historic Airline Schedule Snapshot' as part of our Throwback Thursday series, where we look back at the historic flight operations of a current or defunct airline.
