Airlines’ expansion flying into infrastructure airpocket

Bangalore: Under-developed and ill-equipped small airports with good air-traffic potential are now beginning to hamper the expansion plans of airline operators, who want to grab a bigger marketshare through higher volumes.
For instance, Air Deccan was forced to withdraw its flights on the Delhi-Kanpur-Delhi, Lucknow-Kanpur-Lucknow and Mumbai-Nashik-Mumbai routes because Kanpur and Nashik airports do not having night landing facilities.The budget carrier also faces other constraints as shorter watch hours (operation hours) at these airports, which do not go beyond 6 pm. SpiceJet Ltd shelved its plans to fly to the centrally located Raipur because of an extremely short runway.At Benares, too, where it has recently launched a flight, the airline seems to be on the back-foot because of shortage of parking bays and terminal space at the airport.
But airlines feel these problems are short term in nature. “I believe it will take some time for the government to match up with the explosion of growth in the aviation sector,” says Go Air chief commercial officer Raj Halve.
09/08/06 Praveena Sharma/Daily News & Analysis

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