Easyjet’s current route from London Luton to Belfast International is to switch to Belfast City airport next year, “to assess if Easyjet passengers find a benefit in flying to an airport closer to the City of Belfast when travelling on shorter routes”.
The twice-daily flights will move over to Belfast City from January 7, 2010, but for now all of the carrier’s other routes to the city will remain at Belfast International. Easyjet says that if the switch is successful it plans to provide greater frequencies on the Luton-Belfast City route, and will also consider additional services to the airport “over time”.
Commenting on the decision Paul Simmons, Regional General Manager for the UK said:
“Easyjet is committed to Northern Ireland, very committed. We are No. 1 in the region, but we are not complacent. That is why we want to see if our passengers flying on selected shorter routes would prefer to fly via Belfast City Airport. The only way to actually do this properly is to run a route from there. We will take our time in assessing the passenger feedback and then take a view on how best to configure our operations between the two airports in the longer term”.
Passengers who have already booked to travel from Luton to Belfast International from January 7 onwards will be given the choice of a free transfer over to the Belfast route, or a full refund.
Easyjet will be the only carrier offering flights from Luton to Belfast City. The airport, which is located around two miles from the city centre, is also served by Bmi from London Heathrow, Ryanair from Stansted, and Flybe from Gatwick.
For more information visit easyjet.com, belfastcityairport.com.
Report by Mark Caswell
