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Aviation History
1997
1997 - 1228.PDF
REGIONAL AVIATION Regional airlines are transforminj previously closed market France's revolution JULIAN MOXON/PARIS THE ANNOUNCEMENT ON 18 February by French regional airline Brit Air that it was to place the launch order for the 70-seat Series 700 version of the high ly successful 50-seat Bombardier Canadair Regional Jet (CRJ) served only to confirm the revolution taking place in France's regional-air line industry. In placing die order, Brit Air president Xavier Leclerc was not only winning the advantage of a beneficial launch price for the aircraft, but was expressing real confidence in die prospects for his airline. The same is true of his two main French com petitors, Air Littoral and Regional Airlines. According to Air Littoral president Marc Dufour: "There is no industry like it for growth at present". With annual passenger increases reaching 20% in some areas, French regional airlines are having to adjust with unprecedent ed speed, and have already achieved a major rationalisation of fleets and routes. "Recovery is behind us. Growth is ahead," says Dufour. The apparent sudden success of France's regional airlines can be traced almost directly to the arrival of the deregulated air-transport mar ket in Europe, and ultimately France, and the resulting disappearance of the rigid state con trols over the national route structure. "Now, at last, we can rationalise and optimise our opera tions so that we can operate more efficiendy," says Dufour. Besides the recent Brit Air CRJ-700 order (for four aircraft in addition to the nine 50-seat CRJs it has already purchased), there was Air Littoral's decision in January to buy seven CRJs to add to the eight already in the fleet, and Regional Airlines' recent order for ten Embraer EMB-145s. "We think jets are what the passen ger now expects in terms of comfort," says Regional Airlines' president Jean-Paul Dubreuil, who adds that the aircraft may replace some, if not all, of the airline's existing 50-seat Saab 2000 high-speed turboprops. TURBOPROP ROLE These three biggest regional carriers in France plan to retain turboprops in their route struc tures, at least for the time being, creating in effect a fleet structure which will allow them to use the cheaper-to-operate turboprops on exist ing short-range routes while deploying their regional jets to expand services on the longer- range point-to-point services now appearing. Dufour is clearly happy with the way things are going: "With the arrival of our new aircraft, we will have the youngest fleet in Europe", he says, adding that the regional jets will provide an "essential element" of the future economic suc cess of the airline. "We have a strong interest in purchasing the CRJ-700," he says. He adds that the rationalisation of the Air Littoral fleet reflects direcdy the changes taking place in European air transport. "Before liber alisation, it was impossible to be fully competi tive. Now, we are in a position to optimise our routes according to market conditions. That is what we always wanted." In common with Regional Airlines, Air Littoral is pursuing a strategy based around the development of hubs - a policy made easier by the hexagonal shape of France, which lends itself better to "cross routeings" than, for exam ple, the UK with its "long, narrow" profile, per mitting a far higher number of potential route combinations. Accordingly, in late 1996, Air Littoral added Nice as a second hub to Montpellier, which has been working as a hub for north-south connec- 40 FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL 7 - 13 May 1997
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