New Era For Airports - OpenSkies Airline Launch
A new era for airports in Europe and North America began on Thursday with the launch of British Airways' OpenSkies airline.
The airline has been established to take advantage of the Open Skies Treaty, which came into effect earlier this year.
The Treaty, which came into effect on 30th March, enables any airline to fly non-stop between any airport in Europe and any airport in the US. It ends the previous spider's web of bilateral flight agreements between European countries and the US government.
BA's OpenSkies airline is the first company specifically set up to take advantage of the benefits of Open Skies. The airline will be running flights from Paris Orly and Brussels to New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport.
The first OpenSkies flight took off at 10.49 local time from Orly, and is due to land at JFK at 1.25pm Eastern Time.
Open Skies Treaty
The Open Skies treaty is set to have a major impact on airport operations in Europe and North America.
The liberalising agreement is designed to increase competition on transatlantic routes, with the effect being that airlines are now able to operate from multiple airports in Europe to American airports, or vice versa. This will lead to more transatlantic flights being operated from airports across Europe.
To this end, BA's OpenSkies operation plans to be operating flights to the US from up to six airports around Europe by the end of 2009, such as Amsterdam and Milan.
Other airlines have taken advantage of the Treaty. For example, Air France, which could previously only fly to America from French airports, started services from London Heathrow to Los Angeles
Some business analysts believe the worsening economic climate could undermine airlines' attempts to take advantage of the Treaty.
However, BA remains bullish - with BA's Chief Executive saying the fact that OpenSkies has financial and marketing backing from the mainline BA operation will help the airline become established.
Analysts say the big question is whether airlines will take advantage of the Open Skies Treaty by expanding their route networks from European airports, given the uncertain economic climate.
Source - Airport International's Aviation Correspondent
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