Stephen Kavanagh, Aer Lingus Chief Executive, announced the 2017 Dublin summer schedule including a new US route to Miami, Florida, and extra flights from Dublin to Los Angeles, Chicago and Orlando. This is the largest ever transatlantic schedule with 2.5 million seats in the market for 2017. Two new European routes were also announced, to Porto in Portugal and Split in Croatia.
The new Miami route is in addition to Aer Lingus’s existing transatlantic routes to Boston, Chicago, New York, Orlando, San Francisco, Washington and Toronto from Dublin, and Boston and New York from Shannon, as well as the new routes to Los Angeles, Newark and Hartford, which commenced this year.
The airline will also increase its Los Angeles flight to a daily service for summer 2017, Dublin to Orlando will increase to four times per week, and Chicago will also increase to a double daily service in the same period.
The growth plan underpins Aer Lingus’s successful strategy of expanding its Dublin Airport base into a major European transatlantic gateway. The convenience of US Customs and Border Protection services at Dublin has enhanced the continued growth of Aer Lingus’s Dublin operation as a connecting gateway. Dublin Airport’s connectivity to North America has grown rapidly over the past six years seeing it move from 11th position in 2010 to fifth position in 2016 on the league table of European transatlantic airports.
The expansion also comes after a successful year as part of International Airlines Group (IAG), which also saw Aer Lingus awarded a 4-star rating from Skytrax, the international air transport rating organisation, making it Ireland’s only airline with such an award and placing it among the top 40 airlines in the world for quality and service.
The expansion comes off the back of International Airlines Group’s commitment to expand the Aer Lingus transatlantic business, increase Ireland’s connectivity and create high quality jobs across the airline.
Stephen Kavanagh said: “We are delighted to announce the further expansion of our transatlantic network with the addition of Dublin to Miami and increased frequency to Los Angeles, Orlando and Chicago improving connectivity to North America. New routes from Dublin to Porto and Split will continue to offer the choice, service and value that delivered our Skytrax 4-star accreditation and we look forward to welcoming guests onboard these new services in 2017.”
Vincent Harrison, Dublin Airport Managing Director, said he was delighted to welcome the expansion of Aer Lingus services at Dublin next year: “We are delighted that Aer Lingus has decided to launch new routes from Dublin to Miami, Porto and Split next year and also to expand capacity on three of its existing transatlantic routes. These new routes and additional frequencies will offer more choice to both business and leisure customers and will also add new options for passengers choosing to connect at Dublin Airport.”
