Air New Zealand Air Points - EK studies AKL hub, possible AKL-LAX/SFO/NAN/EZE route

ATWOnline (23FEB04) (http://www.atwonline.com) reported that Emirates is studyin an expansion plan at Auckland, which will see AKL as major EK hub in South Pacific.

Under the plan, EK may launch AKL-EZE/LAX/SFO/NAN, which will be part of their own northern and southern hemisphere Round-The-Workd service.

EK plans to extend its PER service to either CHC or AKL in oct/nov.

Correct me if I am wrong - but i was under the impression that the AKL international terminal as it stands now only just copes with the present PAX throughput.

I suppose if such a plan was to go ahead it wouldn't be such a bad thing for AKL airport shares.

Ouch! If EK decide such a plan is worth pressing on with, that will provide a major test for the government's aviation competition policy... and it would certainly give the QF/NZ merger rhetoric a bit more credibility, too.

NZ's unilateral open market policies (and I'm not just talking aviation) have always relied on the fact that distance and size makes the NZ market unattractive to many, allowing the govt the luxury of claiming the moral high ground as far as free trade is concerned. When a cashed-up, opportunistic and expansion-minded operator like EK comes along, however, you realise just how vulnerable the whole deck of cards could be...

If only EK would join Star Alliance.
Ozflier

Interesting. Comes close on the heels of the rumour about DXB-AKL non-stop, which suddenly makes a lot more sense.

AKL-EZE would be awesome!!!

Is there a flight across the South Pacific at the moment ?

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by flamboyant 1:
AKL-EZE would be awesome!!!

Is there a flight across the South Pacific at the moment ?</font>

Presume you mean to South America. Yes - Lan Chile and Aerolineas Argentinas both have Oz-AKL-SthAm.

I personally would love to see EK do that, Its time Auckland Airport came up to such standards as Singapore, Hong Kong, Tokyo. At the moment, Auckland leaves a lot to be desired and is really letting down the country. If EK brings in another 20 flights a day, build a bigger terminal!

What about such things as Transit tours like Singapore has! What a fantastic idea!!!

Dave

Er, how exactly will increasing the number of passengers through AKL improve the experience for each pax? Unless AIAL pick up their act, each additional passenger makes the experience worse for the rest, as there is more overcrowding and competition for the existing facilities!

Having thought about this some more, it's hard to see what is really in this for EK. AKL is not really on the way from anywhere to anywhere else much - Australia to USA is about as good as it gets, and that is not the hugest of markets. Latin America, as people have already pointed out, doesn't offer much potential for making serious money. I realise that NZ has open skies with Dubai, but they still need to get approval from the other countries involved, most of whom are also keen to protect their national airlines. While somewhere like Rarotonga would be very keen to approve more capacity, since they don't have any airline of their own to look after, I hardly see that as being a goldmine for EK!

Well if you have extra x amount of flights in per day, your forced to better your facility.

Anyway without getting into the nitty gritty that we here on FT like getting into all to often, I think it would be a good thing for NZ by way of increased employment the chance of a more updated airport ect ect ect!

Really, there is no difference in time going SIN-AKL-LAX than SIN-NRT-LAX

Dave

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by MRSTARALLIANCE:
Well if you have extra x amount of flights in per day, your forced to better your facility.</font>

The problem is that these days AIAL view their shareholders as infinitely more important than their customers, and are taking the approach of 'let the customers come first and be inconvenienced for a few years, and *then* we'll build the new facilities'. The whole Whenuapai thing is ridiculous, but it would be nice if it made AIAL sit up and realise that they may not always have a monopoly in the region.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by MRSTARALLIANCE:
Anyway without getting into the nitty gritty that we here on FT like getting into all to often, I think it would be a good thing for NZ by way of increased employment the chance of a more updated airport ect ect ect!

Really, there is no difference in time going SIN-AKL-LAX than SIN-NRT-LAX.
Dave</font>

By the 'nitty gritty' do you mean getting your facts straight? Like the fact that SIN-AKL-LAX is over a third further than SIN-NRT-LAX (which is in fact almost identical distance-wise to the nonstop SIN-LAX flights)! Like the fact that Japan presents a massive additional market in terms of volume, wealth and business traffic, unlike NZ! Like the fact that extra seats doesn't guarantee extra passengers, and when AirNZ (who is the incumbent on almost all of the proposed EK routes) feels the pinch that also translates directly into local employment levels!

Sorry to be pedantic about the "nitty gritty", and I'm not trying to have a go at you, but IMHO one of the great things about FT, unlike sites such as A.Net for example, is that there is a reasonably informed level of debate. If you guys think I'm talking bollocks then you are more than welcome to tell me so - it happens to me all the time! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif

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[This message has been edited by MRSTARALLIANCE (edited Feb 26, 2004).]