Airlines plan flights to tier-II cities

After facing stiff competition on the metro routes, several airlines, including Air-India Express, SpiceJet, Air Deccan and Kingfisher, are eyeing the tier II cities. Air-India Express officials said they were ready to add tier II cities to their network soon, while said his airlines would start services to Jammu once it gets a clearance from the government.
According to sector analysts, though load factors may not be very high on these sectors, the realisations will be high. Also, getting prime time slots would not be an issue.
For instance, Air-India chairman and managing director V Thulasidas is keen to connect to the lesser-known destinations. SpiceJet has started operations to Vadodara and Kingfisher set to follow suit. According to Manoj Chacko, general manager, sales, Kingfisher, “Recently, we launched services on the Kolkata-Raipur and Kolkata-Dimapur routes. We are hoping to start services to other tier II cities as well. .”
Air Deccan, too, has recently started operating on the Delhi-Leh routes with its 180 seater A-320.
28/05/07 Shaheen Mansuri/Financial Express

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Categories: airports, General Aviation May 2007, New May 2007