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Updated 15.01
THREE NEW ROUTES will be available to passengers at Cork Airport next summer with direct flights to two French tourist hotspots and to the German city of Dusseldorf.
Aer Lingus today launched its summer 2016 schedule, which included more than 250,000 extra seats to short-haul destinations from Dublin, Cork and Shannon.
The plan includes a new twice-weekly service from Cork to the German destination, as well as direct flights from Dublin to Pisa in Italy, Murcia in Spain and Montpelier in France.
The airline will also operate more frequent flights to several spots, including to the popular coastal resorts of Faro in Portugal and Malaga in Spain from Shannon Airport.
French connection
Earlier today, regional carrier CityJet announced flights direct from Cork to the French cities of Nantes and La Rochelle next summer.
From mid-June until the end of August, the Swords-based airline will fly its 95-seat Avro RJ85 planes twice a week to La Rochelle on the southwest coast of France.
It will also operate a weekly flight to Nantes, the largest city in the country’s northwest. Fares will start from €69 each way.
CityJet executive chairman Pat Byrne said the flights would provide convenient access to the popular tourist regions, while also opening up Cork as a destination for more holidaymakers from France.
The announcement follows the recent launch of the airline’s services from Cork Airport to London City Airport. CityJet started flying 18 services a week between the two hubs at the start of the month.
Budget carrier Norwegian Air recently revealed it would be operating the first transatlantic flights from Cork in more than 50 years with direct connections to the US east coast from May.
Passenger figures have been declining at the regional airport for several years, plunging from 2.43 million in 2010 to about 2.1 million in 2014.
First published 10.38
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Great news that Cork airport is finally picking up.
Flights start from mid June. Great business model. Cork should be out of both GAA championships by then ;-)
I red thumbed you out of loyalty to my county…. But it’s a good point…
Lol….nice one Mary
France, and Boston next year. NY added in 2017 according to plans. This is great news as I live about 6 miles away from Cork airport and have at many times in my life had to travel to Shannon to head to the US, or get out of bed myself at 4am to drive there and back to collect family.
Political will could have made all this happen years ago. In 2014, Cork Airport handled 2.1 million passengers, making it the state’s second busiest airport in terms of passenger numbers, after Dublin.
I suspect Cork will eventually cause major problems Shannon.
I don’t know if it was political will as much as commercial will.
There was never any incentive for the existing airlines to fly transatlantic from Cork as they would just be taking passengers off their own services. It took a new entrant to shake things up a bit in this space. What will be interesting is whether the other airlines react should Norwegian prove successful.
Both the French routes have operated before (Nantes by Aer Arann and before that Jetmagic; La Rochelle by Ryanair), but fell victim to Ryanair’s shuffling of routes to playing airports off against each other, with La Rochelle moved up to Shannon and a competing route to Nantes launched there. Both of these destinations have been cut from Shannon now though.
The major fall in fuel prices I expect is playing the biggest role.
Sgt, will Cork have immigration pre-clearance like Shannon?
It will have to, Rory.
One way to ticket to NY I presume Sgt? :) you do right my friend!
No cork will not have pre clearance (nor does it have to). That sort of investment by both the airport, government and US Authorities would require more than a shaky few times a week service by an LCC carrier I’m afraid!
Yep, that is beautiful La Rochelle!
If we had a fast train service like most other First world countries all our airports would be accessible. Being such a small country it should not take 6 hours to travel Kerry to Donegal
Bang on Tom! But we dont get that kind of investment outside the Pale in this country.
Aer Lingus have also announced major growth from Belfast and 3 new short haul routes to Murcia, Pisa and Montpellier so expect the FR high prices on Murcia and Pisa to be gone now that EI are moving in.
Plus the new long haul routes coming in a few week…
those new routes are form Dublin by the way
have your say