Mark Laroche said Air France has suggested it could add more flights to its newly announced Ottawa-Paris schedule if the customer demand is there.
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Ottawa International Airportās CEO is hoping Air Franceās decision to start flying directly from Paris to Ottawa this summer will clear the runway for more non-stop transatlantic routes to YOW.Ā
Franceās largest airline announced Thursday it plans to start flying between Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport and Ottawa International Airport five times a week beginning on June 27. It marks the first direct route between YOW and Europe since early 2020, when virtually all international flights from the airport were suspended during the pandemic.
āItās a great connection,ā Ottawa International Airport Authority chief executive Mark Laroche told OBJ on Friday. āItās something that we were pursuing for a long time.āĀ
The new service will run on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays and Sundays using the carrierās 224-seat Airbus A330-200 fleet. Laroche said Air France has suggested it could add more flights to its Ottawa schedule if the customer demand is there.
āIt all depends on the response,ā he said. ā(Airbus aircraft) are extremely expensive assets, and so they can lose a lot of money very fast. If thereās not sufficient response from the market, you lose (routes) very quickly. Itās very hard to get back.ā
Ottawa airport officials have been eyeing Charles de Gaulle as a potential destination for about a decade due to its status as one of Europeās busiest hubs with connections to other parts of Europe, Asia, the Middle East, Africa and beyond.Ā
Laroche said the airport authority worked with partners such as Ottawa Tourism, Tourism Outaouais, local boards of trade and Destination Canada, a Crown corporation that promotes tourism across the country, to land the new route. He refused to comment on whether the airport is providing any financial incentives to Air France.
He said talks between the carrier and YOW began heating up about three months ago. Laroche noted that Air France CEO Ben Smith, a Canadian who previously served as Air Canadaās chief operating officer, was familiar with Ottawaās tourism industry from his days as the operator of a retail corporate travel agency in the 1990s.
āHe knows the market well,ā Laroche said. āThatās an (advantage) when you donāt have to convince the CEO of an airline of the potential of a market.
āObviously, Air France saw an opportunity. This is very late in the season to announce a summer route, so they reacted to this opportunity quickly, and good on them. Weāre super happy to have them.ā
The news comes as Ottawaās airport is slowly regaining momentum after getting hit hard during the pandemic.
Traffic at the terminal fell from an average of nearly 14,000 passengers a day in 2019 to fewer than 3,300 at the height of the COVID-19 crisis two years later. The daily average ticked back up to 8,200 passengers in 2022, but only about 255 people a day boarded international flights last year ā a number YOW officials are eager to grow.
Laroche said heās optimistic that routes to vital European hubs like London and Frankfurt will be restored to the airportās schedule in the not-too-distant future.
āSuccess begets success,ā he said. āWhat weāre saying is that Ottawa has an appetite for more direct connections, and if Air France is successful, there may be other interest from Air France or from other airlines. Itās ultimately their decisions, and itās based on facts and evidence of a positive market response.ā
Air France becomes the first carrier to operate transatlantic flights to Ottawa since Air Canada stopped direct routes to London and Frankfurt early in the pandemic after the federal government restricted international flights to airports in Montreal, Toronto, Calgary and Vancouver.
Whether the countryās largest airline gets back in the international mix at YOW remains to be seen, Laroche said.
āItās Air Canadaās business strategy,ā he said. āWill this make them have a second look? I donāt know. I welcome all airlines that offer service at our airport.ā
The news comes on the heels of Porter Airlinesā recent move to launch four new direct routes from YOW to Boston, Newark, Quebec City and Thunder Bay this spring.Ā
The Toronto-based airline, which just began constructing two new aircraft maintenance hangars at the airport, is also debuting flights between Torontoās Pearson International Airport and Ottawa this month.
Laroche said he expects Porter to announce more news related to YOW shortly.Ā
āThe airport is in a good position right now,ā he said.
