The nation’s Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA) yesterday said it would take more time for the nation to link Taipei Songshan Airport with airports in China and Japan, but that the goal was to create more business opportunities for local firms by building one of the busiest air hubs in the Asia-Pacific region.
President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) vision of connecting the Taipei airport with airports in Shanghai, Tokyo and Seoul has a missing link because direct flight services between Songshan and South Korea’s Gimpo International Airport will not materialize until next year.
The vision, titled “A Golden Aviation Circle in Northeast Asia,” (東北亞黃金航圈) was one of the promises Ma made during his 2008 presidential campaign.
Insufficient airport capacity was the major problem, CAA officials told officials from the Ministry of Transportation and Communications (MOTC) yesterday.
“Songshan Airport has limited capacity,” CAA Director-General Yin Chen-pong (尹承篷) said. “It can accommodate more international flights after the airport renovation project is complete in October next year.”
INCHEON
“Incheon International Airport [the largest international airport in South Korea] still has room to accommodate more international flights,” Yin said. “It is unlikely that they [South Korea] will open another hub for international flights.”
Besides, neither Taiwan nor South Korea are eager to talk about that possibility at the moment, Ying said.
Gimpo now has direct flight services with Hongqiao and Haneda. Taiwan and South Korea had a chance to meet last year, but the meeting was canceled for reasons unknown, said Betty Cheng (程嘉莉), CAA’s planning division director.
All-cargo
Cheng said that Taiwan has limited the number of passenger flights from South Korea and banned all-cargo flight services. Therefore, several key issues are very likely to be brought up when both sides negotiate on direct flight services, she said.
“We estimate that lifting the ban on all-cargo flight services and even granting South Korean cargo flight operators the right to fly to a third country after landing at our airports will be hot button issues,” Cheng said. “On the other hand, we do not need South Korea’s agreement to fly the extension flight to a third country.”
Direct flight services between Songshan and Shanghai Hongqiao were launched on June 14. China Airlines (CAL, 華航), EVA Air (長榮) and TransAsia Airways (復興) jointly offer 14 direct flights per week. As of Sunday last week, the average passenger occupancy rate for Songshan-Hongqiao flights was 84.2 percent.
Direct flight services between Songshan and Japan’s Haneda Airport are scheduled to be launched on Oct. 31 after Haneda inaugurates its fourth runway.
CAL, EVA, Japan Airlines (JAL) and All Nippon Airways (ANA) will initially provide a total of eight flights per day.
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