As Haneda Airport prepares to open its runways to international flights next month, its Japanese carriers will be the main benefiaries, US airlines given the least convenient time slots.
Opening Haneda Airport has been an important move by Japan to keep Tokyo as an aviation hub, the Associated Press reported.
Japanese carriers All Nippon Airways and Japanese Airlines will benefit the most from the new services to Haneda Airport, followed by a “handful” of Asian carriers including Cathay Pacific and Malaysian Airlines.
However, US airlines are likely to have the least to gain given that they are restricted to flights leaving or arriving between 10.00pm and 7.00am, the least popular flying times for travellers.
“We’d like other times in the future, obviously,” American Airlines Asia Pacific managing director Theo Panagiotoulias told the news agency.
“In an ideal world, you’d like to have your flight arrive and then turn the aircraft around as quickly as possible and fly out again to have the aircraft in the air. With the current times, we can’t do that,” he said.
“That’s not optimal.”
American Airlines was one of three US airlines that won slots in Haneda, but its flight from New York will have to park in Haneda for eight hours before taking off, and have to pay the associated fees to stay there while Japanese carriers who are already enmeshed in domestic schedules at Haneda can plan accordingly.
According to the news agency, US carriers are happy with what they can get at the moment as the long-awaited opening of Japan’s skies seems to finally be underway.
Delta Air Lines president Edward Bastian told the Associated Press he was excited about winning two of the four slots open to American carriers as it “took years of negotiations” and added that the airline will work with Japanese authorities to improve their time slots.
Tokyo International Air Terminal Corporation corporate planning president Yoichi Hirai said the late time slots were a government policy to discourage Narita’s ousting as the main international airport.
“But the government policy is starting to change to make Haneda more of an international hub, and so it’s looking into daytime slots for US destinations,” he said. haneda airport