Christchurch Airport is optimistic there’ll be further international expansion in addition to widebody seasonal services announced by Air New Zealand this week. CHC aeronautical manager Gordon Bevan says they may not be new airlines but existing ones expanding their operation.
“I think we’ve got some more good news coming once the airlines have settled down on their schedules for the northern winter,’’ he told Travel Today.
He says new airlines get a lot of attention but attracting them was hard, compared to working with incumbents to expand their existing capacity. From late Oct, NZ is restarting some long-paused non-stop routes from CHC-Tokyo, Singapore and Perth. Bevan says that will double wide body seats this summer out of the southern city.
“They’re looking like seasonal, but they could bleed into the northern summer season as well; that just depends on performance.’’ CHC is not subsidising any routes because the market is fragile. “We would never distort competition in our market.’’
The airport company adds that its doesn’t charge for transfers from international to domestic flights.
. . . NZ Expansion
NZ will by the end of the year have more Dreamliners in its fleet. Chief executive Nikhil Ravishankar says 90% of its widebody fleet will continue to operate out of Auckland. However, the push into CHC, where the airline has previously been criticised as underserving with long haul routes, was part of an ambition to generate more economic activity throughout the country.
The airline is trimming and consolidating some existing domestic and short-haul services and undergoing a sweeping company-wide reset, the results of which will be known soon.
But at the TRENZ tourism event, he hinted at further expansion. “I cannot wait to share more with you on this in a few months.”
