easyJet moves Zurich route to Basel
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easyJet moves Zurich route to Basel
easyJet have announced that on 1 November 2004, they will commence a new twice-daily route between London (Luton) and Basel (Mulhouse).
This will replace their Luton to Zurich service, which will fly for the last time on 31 October 2004. easyJet refuse to continue flying to Zurich after a reported 132% increase in landing fees at the airport in recent years, making it the most expensive airport currently used by the low-cost airline. Apparently Basel has a “management team that is also enthusiastic about low cost", and easyJet are keen to emphasise the importance of this to their business model.
This will replace their Luton to Zurich service, which will fly for the last time on 31 October 2004. easyJet refuse to continue flying to Zurich after a reported 132% increase in landing fees at the airport in recent years, making it the most expensive airport currently used by the low-cost airline. Apparently Basel has a “management team that is also enthusiastic about low cost", and easyJet are keen to emphasise the importance of this to their business model.
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Unlike many other low cost operators, EasyJet always seemed to prefer using more mainstream airports - AMS and CDG are two which come to mind. I would have thought that would have been to their advantage, as the ones they serve often have better transport links and facilities than the ones served by Ryanair. But Switzerland is not the cheapest country in Europe to operate into.
Sabena and Sobelair - gone but never forgotten.
Louise
Louise
In my opinion it's quite a miracle that EZY stayed at ZRH that long ! I expected they would leave even more quickly as ZRH is one of the most expensive airports in Europe when talking about passenger fees and taxes.
@ Avro :
Regards, Robin Bamps.
@ Avro :
Indeed, that's also the reason why Helvetic isn't the most succesful LCC I guess. A friend of mine flew with Helvetic from ZRH to Prague a couple of months ago, and on the return flight PRG-ZRH there were just 8 passengers on boardBut ZRH is like BRU a very expensive airport and thus not perfect for low cost carriers.
Regards, Robin Bamps.
Helvetic Airways is about to get serious competition from another Swiss LCC start-up in 2005.Robin_Bamps wrote: Indeed, that's also the reason why Helvetic isn't the most succesful LCC I guess.
Helvetia Express is the name of the new airline, and it is the Swiss affiliate of the German LCC Germania Express.
More importantly, Helvetia Express is set to inaugurate services to Brussels with F100 equipment somewhere in 2005.
This is no big surprise, given the fact that mother company Germania Express already wanted to inaugurate services to Brussels in January 2004.
The Germania Express plans were aborted due to the fact that Helvetic Airways also entered the ZRH-BRU-ZRH market around the same period of time.
Germania Express still has slots at their disposal in Brussels who will be transferred to Helvetia Express, and since Helvetic Airways is no longer serving Brussels, they feel its time to finally break the Swiss International Airlines monopoly on this route.
Let us wait and see if they really take-off, though Helvetia Express is currently recruiting: http://www.hxx.ch