A while back Virgin Express was assigned takeoff and landing slots at Paris Orly airport along with Easyjet after Air Lib went bankrupt. Virgin Express was given 5,840 slots by Cohor with Iberia, Air France, Brit Air and Aeris also gaining slots.
Virgin Express, however, said it would try and attempt to gain additional slots and set up a low fare airline something France is generally lacking. They saw a large market for Paris, which was starved of a real low cost operation.
But late last week Virgin Express said it would not start low cost operations from Orly due to its failed attempt to gain enough slots to make a profit. They could only fly three routes with the amount of slots they received and two of them (Bordeaux and Toulon) would not be so. It would be a case that the fleet usage would have been too low.
By: Saab 2000 - 18th May 2003 at 18:05
Better that they did not proceed with it rather than finding out the hard way that these routes would not make a profit. Seems like Virgin Express can’t make their mind up about expansion, Shannon closed, Cologne/Bonn, Rome, Stansted etc never became anything much. Can add Orly now.
By: Hand87_5 - 18th May 2003 at 14:34
AF lobbying once again !!!
By: dan777 - 18th May 2003 at 13:52
Hopefully easyJet will be able to gain the additional slots and add Rome, Toulon and Bordeaux to their list of expanding destinations from Paris Orly : Toulouse, Nice, Barcelona, Marseille and Milan – Linate.
Regards
dan777
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May 18, 2003 at 1:31 pm