Airport launches four new Euro routes

ALTHOUGH Aer Lingus yesterday announced four new routes from Cork to continental Europe, commencing next summer, a long-haul destination is not on the schedule as yet.

The new routes from Cork will be to Rome, Munich, Nice and Faro in Portugal.

At noon yesterday, introductory return prices of between €70 and €100, including all taxes, were due to go on sale.

Aer Lingus serves seven routes direct from Cork - London Heathrow, Amsterdam, Paris, Malaga, Alicante, Barcelona and Milan.

Apart from Paris and Alicante, the airline also plans to increase capacity.

Seamus Kearney, chief operations officer at Aer Lingus, said the addition of the routes, along with existing ones, would increase annual capacity by 50% and would deliver 1.25 million seats into and out of Cork.

As part of the expansion, Aer Lingus will also be basing three new Airbus 320 aircraft in Cork.

The announcement would not be affected by any management buy-out, because the recent jobs announcement was inclusive of the decision.

“The business plan for Aer Lingus will be implemented, irrespective of the ownership,” said Mr Kearney.

On the question of transatlantic flights out of Cork, he said Aer Lingus had pressed “extremely hard” for changes in the US-Irish bilateral agreement, and if those changes happened, the company had plans for four routes.

“Cork-JFK in New York would be one of those.”

Cork Airport director Joe O’Connor said the announcement was the most important in his time at the airport. It would have a sizeable impact on passenger numbers, which will grow by 6% this year.

Mr Kearney said Aer Lingus had repositioned itself as a low fares carrier and while their focus had centred on short-haul operations, it was now being restated to include transatlantic operations and potential new long-haul destinations.