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Last summer, the people of Siena woke up one day and opened their copies of La Repubblica to discover that their toy airport, built in the 1930s by Mussolini for the air force and of very little use to anyone since the end of the war, was on the threshold of dramatic change. The low-costs were coming! The no-frills revolution was heading Siena’s way.”Siena’s airport takes flight” proclaimed the piece in the business section of the paper. “A radical transformation” is on the way, reported the article, “from fewer than 12,000 passengers to four million by 2020 with routes in the whole world. While the war of belltowers continues between Florence and Pisa, Siena is preparing for a great leap.”

The aim of the operation, claimed the newspaper, was “the low-cost market and executive flights” because the company investing in the plan, a “dedicated transport and infrastructure equity fund” called Galaxy, “has good relations with RyanAir and easyJet, the two most important low cost companies at present, and knows that the other companies are very attracted.”

But within weeks, a disparate group of people from the city and the surrounding area – a tour guide, a lawyer, owners of bed and breakfast establishments, one or two foreigners – got together and formed a committee to oppose the airport’s expansion. As the local press was uniformly backing the project they published a one-off magazine stating the case against. And when they held a demonstration in November, close to 3,000 people in this city of 60,000 turned out to join them.

source: The Independent

GOL Linhas Aereas Inteligentes S.A. , the parent company of Brazilian airlines GOL Transportes Aereos S.A. and VRG Linhas Aereas S.A., announces that VRG began selling tickets for its Sao Paulo — Madrid route, the Company’s ninth international destination. Flights to Madrid will begin on January 28.”‘Since Madrid is one of the most popular tourist and business destinations for Brazilians traveling abroad, this is an important step in our international route expansion plan,'” says Lincoln Amano, VRG’s commercial director. The Company currently flies to Bogota, Colombia; Buenos Aires, Argentina; Caracas, Venezuela; Santiago, Chile; Mexico City, Mexico; Frankfurt, Germany; London, England; Paris, France, and Rome, Italy.

source: CNN.com

A former United Airlines flight attendant who narrowly missed being on one of the hijacked jets that crashed into the World Trade Center has settled a federal lawsuit that accused the airline of wrongfully firing her after she was unable to work because of posttraumatic stress disorder.

Deborah Jackson of Plaistow, N.H., had worked for United Airlines out of Logan International Airport for 17 years when the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks occurred, according to the suit. She reached a settlement with the airline under terms that were not disclosed in papers filed yesterday in US District Court in Boston.

source: Boston.com

The Miramar, Fla.-based airline will begin offering one daily flight on April 14 and a second daily flight on May 1.

“‘This is terrific news for San Antonians,'” San Antonio Aviation Director Mark Webb says. “‘Spirit is not only connecting two vibrant cities with non-stop service, but they’re also bringing to the market an ultra-low cost business model that I think San Antonians are going to find very appealing’.”

Airport officials are hopeful that these two flights will form the basis of a larger partnership between the airport and the airline in the future.

source: San Antonio Business Journal

Tiger Airways Singapore, flight TR717 from Perth to Singapore, was postponed on Saturday night after the captain became concerned about his crew working overtime.

Because of its low-cost, the airline has no stand-by crew at destinations other than Melbourne and Singapore.

Matt Hobbs, spokesman for the airline’s sister company Tiger Airways Australia, said he didn’t expect overtime issues would be a problem for Adelaide passengers to Melbourne.

“‘They (international crew) can work for 10 hours straight so I don’t think they will go out of hours in Adelaide because it’s a 50-minute flight.”’

Angry passengers were informed of the flight cancellation at 10.30pm, three hours after its scheduled departure, and were told to go home and return the following day or stay at the airport.

source: News.com.au

AirAsia X announced its latest international route from Kuala Lumpur to Hangzhou, China. AirAsia X will be the first airline to service the route from Kuala Lumpur with five weekly services beginning 04-Feb-08. The latest service is the airline’s second long-haul destination after Gold Coast, Australia, which was launched in Nov-07.

source: Peanuts.aero

Business-class-only airline Eos has experienced a strong recovery in bookings after the holiday season, its chief executive said as he defended a business model that has been questioned since the collapse of rival MAXjet.

Jack Williams told Reuters on Tuesday the airline’s four planes were 70 percent full last week and he expected the trend to continue into late January.

“‘For us, the holiday period was pretty seasonal, but we’ve seen a pretty good bounce-back since the New Year,'” he added. U.S. private equity-owned Eos operates at the top end of the transatlantic business class market, serving clients in the major financial institutions, while MAXjet was at the budget end of business class.

source: Guardian

GOL Linhas Aereas Inteligentes S.A. , the parent company of Brazilian airlines GOL Transportes Aereos S.A. and VRG Linhas Aereas S.A., today celebrates its seventh anniversary of operations, transporting more than 75 million passengers across Brazil and South America. The Company, which entered the Brazilian aviation market with the aim of popularizing air transportation, surpassed a 40 percent domestic market share in December 2007 and reported average load factors in 2007 of 70 percent, one of the highest in the industry. GOL’s current fleet of 78 aircraft operates 640 daily flights to 60 destinations, including eight abroad.

source: CNN

The first of a series of regular passenger flight to Antarctica took place on Friday, establishing the first regular service between Australia and the white continent.

A blue ice runway was built at a cost of $41 million, although there is no indication of how long it will last or how it was decided this would be cost effective. The wire service says this feat of engineering will bring scientists and other Australian Antarctic Division staff – but not tourists – to Antarctica on a weekly basis in the warmer months between October and March.

source: Nature

EasyJet will this week launch a credit card with loyalty perks just in time for the post-Christmas rush to book holidays.

The card, which charges interest at 16.9% on purchases – just above the average rate of about 15% – offers one free easyJet flight worth up to £40 including taxes if at least £250 is spent on the card in the first three months.

Also in the first three months it will offer 10% back on easyJet flights and purchases such as hotels and car hire made when booking the flight.

source: This is Money