Govt pushes red-eye flights to ease traffic

New Delhi: The ministry of civil aviation, in an attempt to ease congestion at large airports, plans to offer a set of incentives, including a waiver of landing, parking and navigation charges at airports, to encourage domestic airlines to start the so-called “red-eye” flights between midnight and dawn.
Late-night flights between 11pm and 5am are commonly called red-eye flights in reference to sleep-deprived passengers who travel on such flights. They are cheaper than day flights in countries such as the US, Europe and Australia. Some airlines in India operate late-night flights but they are too few in number, with the last domestic passenger flight at around midnight.
In March this year, the ministry had proposed differential tariffs for landing at the Mumbai, New Delhi and Bangalore airports in peak and non-peak hours, but that plan failed with airline companies declining to change their schedules.
The aviation ministry says there is scope for airlines to increase flights in late-night hours especially to tap international passengers who need to take a connecting international flight late at night or early morning.
04/10/07 Tarun Shukla/Livemint

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Categories: Airports Oct 2007, General Aviation Oct 2007