China Airlines (CAL) and EVA Airways (EVA) were the biggest winners in the allocation of additional cross-strait flights, with each receiving 19 more flights from the Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA) yesterday.
Taiwan and China reached an agreement earlier this month to raise the total number of cross-strait weekly flights from 370 to 558. Carriers on each side will receive an additional 94 weekly flights through the new agreement.
The administration held meetings with the carriers starting last week to address the distribution of the added cross-strait flights, before a conclusion was reached yesterday.
Civil Aeronautics Administration Deputy Director-General Lee Wan-lee (李萬里) said CAL and EVA were each given 19 additional flights because of the size of their fleets, as well as their past record of complying with government policies.
TransAsia Airways and Mandarin Airlines were each given 11 additional flights, while Uni Air received 10.
Meanwhile, CAL, EVA and TransAsia were each awarded one “red-eye” flight to Shanghai.
CAL also received a new flight service to Beijing from Greater Kaohsiung after a random drawing.
Flights to Shanghai and Beijing are coveted by carriers because they are generally in high demand.
Of the 94 new regular flights, five were previously charter flights that were offered on demand only, including two fights from Greater Taichung to Wuhan and Zhengzhou in Hubei and Henan provinces respectively, two from Hualien to Hanzhou, Zhejiang Province, and Wuhan, and one from Hualien to Nanjing.
Far Eastern Air Transport (FAT), which resumed operations in April, was awarded 24 flights on the condition that it increase its fleet size to meet potential demand.
The administration had suspended FAT’s license in May 2008 because of its financial difficulties. When the nation launched cross-strait flight services in July 2008, the administration reserved 15 flights for FAT, but the quota was temporarily shared by five other carriers.
The new agreement gave FAT nine additional flights.
Those nine flights must be available for customers within three months of the airline obtaining them, or else they must be returned.
The administration said tickets to Beijing and Shanghai would drop by 20 percent because of the increased number of flights.
Lee said the airlines would need time to evaluate the demand for different flights and to file applications both in Taiwan and in China. Aside from flights to Shanghai, Lee said a majority of the new flights could be included in flight schedules by the end of October.
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