News Release (13/06/08)
Connecting more popular than ever for South West passengers
More than ten thousand passengers a week are turning their backs on direct flights from London airports and instead travelling between Bristol International and hubs such as Amsterdam-Schiphol, Frankfurt, Paris Charles de Gaulle, New York, Brussels and Oslo, from where they can access connections to hundreds of destinations worldwide.
The success of Lufthansa's three-times daily Frankfurt service, launched in March, has helped push the number of travellers flying between Bristol International and major hub airports over the 10,000 mark for the first time.
The hub trend was identified in the CAA's most recent study of air services at UK regional airports, which found that the proportion of travellers to and from the English regions travelling to the capital to catch international flights had fallen by ten per cent since 2000. Over the same period, regional airports have grown faster than their London counterparts, and now handle 42 per cent of UK passengers.
Less than half of all passengers from the regions now make a surface journey to a London airport before flying, and half of the passengers travelling from a regional airport to a European hub are travelling on to long-haul destinations.
The availability and frequency of flights from Bristol International to major airports around the world makes catching a connecting flight quicker and more reliable than in the past. At the same time, congestion on Britain's roads and the high cost of rail travel has made the option of travelling to London for a flight less attractive.
With full-service scheduled airlines such as Air France (three times daily to Paris Charles de Gaulle), Lufthansa (three times daily to Frankfurt), Continental (daily to New York), KLM (four times daily to Amsterdam) and SAS (regular services to Oslo and Stockholm) all operating from Bristol International, business and leisure travellers from across the South West now have a viable alternative when looking to fly long-haul. Continental alone connects to 230 onward destinations via its Newark hub, while Lufthansa's Bristol-Frankfurt flights connect into the airline's network of over 14,000 flights every week. The dual network of Air France-KLM opens up a further 243 destinations in 106 countries to passengers making the short trip to Paris or Amsterdam.
While cities such as Amsterdam, Paris, Frankfurt and New York are popular destinations themselves, this access to onward connections means that, typically, over half of the passengers arriving on flights from Bristol will be catching onward connections. For example, the top onward destinations via New York from Bristol are Houston (for business passengers) and Orlando (for leisure). Lufthansa connects to long-haul destinations such as Mumbai and Beijing via Franfkurt, while African connections are strong for Air France and Brussels Airlines, with the SAS network covering Scandinavia.
Shaun Browne, Head of Commercial Aviation and Route Development, said:
"The fact that ten thousand passengers a week are travelling between Bristol International and major international hubs proves the concept of using feeder flights to connect to onward destinations. Further increases in this market are possible, as six per cent of Heathrow's passengers still originate in the South West and could be making unnecessary road or rail journeys to London. We are also evaluating the potential of other hub routes such as Copenhagen and Munich to serve the South West."