Aer Lingus is revising its strategy to focus more on connecting passengers as it looks forward to the long delayed opening of a new terminal at its Dublin hub.

The carrier's chief executive, Dermot Mannion, says only 100,000 of its 9 million annual passengers are transit passengers, but the opening of Terminal 2 at Dublin will give Aer Lingus the flexibility to accommodate more. "We're doing very little now but the potential is certainly there going forward," Mannion says.

He adds Terminal 2 is slated to open at the end of 2009 and "will be much more comfortable for our passengers and give us more ­options for transit passengers ­looking to go to the USA".

mannion

Dermot Mannion, Aer Lingus

For more on Aer Lingus and its fight against Ryanair's takeover attempt, check out our video interview at flightglobal.com/mannion

The construction of the new terminal has been delayed for several years over objections from rival Ryanair, but Dublin's airport operator finally secured court approval in January to go ahead with the project. Aer Lingus opened a new but relatively small transfer facility last year at its existing terminal, which will allow it to slowly build up transfer traffic in the lead up to the opening of Terminal 2. In its first move to promote transfers, Aer Lingus will begin selling in April on its websites fares combining its two point-to-point networks. These fares will use the same technology that Aer Lingus has developed to support new joint tickets with JetBlue Airways (see p11).

Since its 2002 transformation into a low-cost carrier, Aer Lingus has treated its long-haul network, which serves seven US cities, and its short-haul network, which serves nearly 100 cities in Europe, as two entirely separate operations. But as it expands its transatlantic operation it needs to rely more on feed. Mannion says Aer Lingus is now studying several potential new US routes, to be launched in 2009 after it takes delivery of three more widebodies.

Mannion says Aer Lingus has an advantage over other European carriers catering to the one-stop Europe-US market because Ireland is the only European country with US customs pre-clearance. "Geographically we're exactly in the right position," he adds.

 




Source: Airline Business

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