Paris Orly sees Transavia and Vueling grow their presence as Air France reduces flights
Latest passenger figures show that Paris ORY handled 1.83m passengers in September (down 30% versus the same month in 2019) which ranks it 15th among European airports, down from 12th in August. The airport has long been perceived as being dominated by Air France, but even before the pandemic struck the carrier only accounted for around one-third of seat capacity. However, when combined with the capacity offered by its in-house LCC Transavia, the Air France Group’s share of airport seats increased to close to 50%.
More recently, Air France has had to give up 18 daily slots at the airport in return for EU approval of the airline’s €4 billion recapitalisation by the French government. These were then awarded to Vueling who subsequently announced plans to start over 20 new routes from Orly beginning in early November.
Meanwhile, as Air France has cut back its operations at Orly, Transavia has increased its capacity. In the week before the start of the winter season the airline began service to Berlin, Krakow, Rome FCO, Santiago de Compostela and Stockholm ARN, with domestic flights to Montpellier set to begin on 8 November. In addition, seasonal flights to Amman, Cape Verde and Hurghada are all expected to start before the end of the year. In total, Transavia will be serving over 50 destinations from Orly this winter.
Air France transfers some domestic routes to Transavia
Compared with November 2019, Air France no longer serves nine domestic routes from Paris ORY. Some of these routes have been transferred to Transavia:
- Biarritz (35-weekly in Nov 19, Transavia flies 22-weekly in Nov 21)
- Bordeaux (61-weekly in Nov 19)
- Brest (37-weekly in Nov 19, Transavia flies 4-weekly in Nov 21)
- Clermont-Ferrand (22-weekly in Nov 19, Amelia flies 11-weekly in Nov 21)
- Lyon (21-weekly in Nov 19)
- Montpellier (60-weekly in Nov 19, Transavia flies 25-weekly in Nov 21)
- Mulhouse (19-weekly in Nov 19)
- Nantes (21-weekly in Nov 19)
- Toulon (37-weekly in Nov 19, Transavia flies 21-weekly in Nov 21)
Routes to Bordeaux, Lyon and Nantes have been dropped from Paris ORY as a result of the French government introducing a ban earlier this year on all domestic flights where the comparable rail journey would take less than two hours and 30 minutes. Flights from these airports to Paris CDG are still allowed to facilitate connections on international routes. The original proposal had been to ban flights where the alternative by rail would have taken less than four hours.