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1.Copa to beef up service to the U.S. and Canada
Panama's Copa Airlines announced today that it will fly to three new destinations and increase frequencies on other key routes as part of its 2011 expansion plan.

Copa's new routes will begin in June when the carrier adds service from Panama City to Toronto Pearson, Nassau in the Bahamas and Porte Alegre, Brazil.

Copa also will add one daily round-trip flight on five routes from its Panama City hub. Two of those routes are to Florida, where Copa's Miami service will increase to four daily round-trip flights and Orlando will go to three daily round-trip flights. Bogota (up to six daily round-trip flights), Lima (three) and Santiago, Chile, (three) are the other routes.

Copa also plans to reorganize its flight schedule, saying in a press release that it will transition from a schedule of four daily flight banks to a six.

That will begin June 15, with Copa saying it "will allow the airline to better utilize (Panama City's) Tocumen Airport's existing infrastructure as well as offer passengers more and better scheduling options."

In its release, Copa asserts that its Panama City hub "continues to be the most efficient and convenient connection point on the continent."



2.2. Re: Canada's air passengers deserve relief, Column, Jan. 17
Canada has chosen a different economic model for its air travel industry than that of the U.S. In Canada, the user-pay system is applied and taxpayers do not support the industry through general revenues. Starting in the late 1980s, Canada commercialized its airports and air navigation system (both not-for-profit organizations now) and deregulated the domestic market in order to promote efficiency of these entities and ensure they better meet their stakeholder needs. Also, Canada's air carriers are private companies.

The government believes these decisions have been the right ones. Our airports are relatively congestion-free, many have won awards for customer satisfaction, and the Canadian Air Navigation Services provider (Nav Canada) is considered a world-class model that has also won international awards. Our air carrier industry is getting stronger and as proof, has weathered many recent socio-economic crises. Finally, despite recent challenging economic times, passenger traffic in Canada is increasing.

On many flights, the majority of taxes and surcharges are imposed by airlines and other non-government entities along with the U.S. government. The only charges imposed by the Canadian federal government are the goods and services/harmonized sales taxes, the air travellers security charge, the fuel excise tax (on domestic flights only) and airport rent, which account for a very small percentage of the cost of a ticket. As for the various airline-imposed charges (for additional luggage or charges), this is now the industry norm and is not unique to Canada.

In addition, airport improvement fees are becoming more prevalent internationally. Airlines have battled through tough times for the past 10 years and are now trying to remain viable through a variety of pricing strategies, as would any corporation.

There is more to a passenger's decision on which airport to use than just cost, there is also convenience and choice of routes. Many Canadians live closer to U.S. airports than they do to Canadian airports. In addition, our relatively strong dollar has lowered the cost of buying air services in the U.S. for Canadians.

Comparing the Canadian and U.S. systems requires caution, as market size and the respective roles of governments also differ significantly. A sizable portion of the U.S. system relies on support from all levels of government. Most airports are state or municipally operated. General tax revenues are also regularly used to help fund aviation security and air navigation services. Despite this greater level of government support, the U.S. infrastructure and air navigation system are falling behind, U.S. airlines regularly seek bankruptcy protection.

We are committed to helping maintain competitiveness in the Canadian air industry.

3. Air Canada island debut delayed

Air Canada's plans to return to Toronto Island next month have been delayed after the airline failed to reach an agreement in time for terminal space at Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport.

The country's largest carrier said Wednesday its talks continue with the terminal's operator, City Centre Terminal Corp., which is also owned by Bob Deluce, the chief executive of its rival, Porter Airlines Inc. But the parties have yet to come to an agreement, which makes Air Canada's planned return to the Island airport in February an impossibility.

"That was probably a bit optimistic," said Peter Fitzpatrick, a spokesman for Air Canada. "It's definitely not going to be February."

The airline has at least one plane ready to go for the new service. One of the Bombardier Q400 aircraft it plans to use on the island is sitting at nearby Pearson International Airport already painted with its new "Air Canada Express" logo.

Both Air Canada and Continental Airlines were granted access to Billy Bishop in June 2010 after the Toronto Port Authority put out a request for carriers interested in using the airport.

Air Canada received 30 daily flights in and out of the airport as a result, Continental was allotted 16, and Porter received 44 more, adding to the 112 daily landing slots it already had.

Since then, Air Canada has negotiated a deal with Sky Regional Airlines Inc. to operate 15 daily flights between Billy Bishop and Montreal using eight leased Q400s turboprops.

Sky Regional Airlines is an upstart operator launched by Toronto aviation veteran Russell Payson specifically for the Air Canada Express contract on the Island.

But before the new service can be launched, the carrier must first hammer out a deal with Mr. Deluce's CCTC.

Air Canada had tried to establish its own terminal on the Island, but that was blocked by the TPA, which has entered into an exclusive agreement with CCTC that prohibits new carriers from using the Billy Bishop airport without using the recently expanded $50-million terminal.

Negotiations between airlines and City Centre Terminal Corp. are confidential and the details cannot be discussed.... We understand that Sky Regional is still in the process of finalizing licensing with Transport Canada. This licensing is required before any service can begin.

Air Canada would like to begin its new service from Billy Bishop as soon as a deal can be reached.

Air Canada has not operated from the Island airport since 2006, when it was evicted by the TPA. Porter Airlines commenced service from the airport shortly thereafter.

The new landing slots were allocated to Air Canada by a third party hired by the TPA.

The process by which they were allocated, however, has become the subject of a lawsuit by Air Canada. Its arguments, however, were rejected in July 2010 by the courts, and while Air Canada has plans to appeal the ruling, a judge ordered the carrier to pay $1.8-million in legal fees to Porter and the TPA earlier this month.

4.High taxes driving tourists away: IATA

Canada is losing out in the global race to woo travellers because of hefty taxes and other airport-related charges, says the head of the International Air Transport Association.

Giovanni Bisignani, director-general and chief executive officer of the group that represents 230 air carriers, said excessive taxation and regulation in Canada are hobbling efforts to attract visitors.

He also called on Ottawa and other governments to work more closely with the air travel industry and in a smarter fashion in the fight against terrorism. There should be less emphasis on “one-size-fits-all screening” or shoe scans and bans on shampoo bottles, with a more targeted approach using government intelligence to root out dangerous passengers at airport checkpoints, he said.

“Instead of having policies to welcome more visitors, Canada’s excessive taxes turn them away. Compared to the U.S., a visit to Canada is $160 more expensive,” Mr. Bisignani said in a speech to the Montreal Council on Foreign Relations on Thursday.

“When I joined IATA in 2002, Canada was the eighth most visited country in the world. Today, it’s 15th,” he said, pointing out that tourism accounted for 650,000 jobs and $71-billion in spending in Canada in 2009.

Among airport revenue-generating sources for Ottawa are the Air Travellers Security Charge, aviation fuel taxes and the GST.

In addition, Canada’s airports paid $257-million in federal rent in 2009, “an unnecessary competitive disadvantage,” said Mr. Bisignani.

“No other country in the world uses this archaic scheme to tax infrastructure. Along with discouraging visitors, the added costs encourage Canadian travellers to start from the U.S. instead of starting from Canada,” he said in reference to lower-cost U.S. airports that are poaching Canadian travellers.

Frédéric Boisvert, of the Transport Minister’s office in Ottawa, said in an e-mail Thursday that the government “is totally committed to helping maintain competition in the Canadian aviation industry. Airline ticket prices contain a variety of fees and charges, of which airfare is the largest. Only a few are implemented by the federal government, the balance by non-government entities or other governments.”

Mr. Bisignani said after the speech he’s “really surprised” that the Canadian government doesn’t seem to realize that its airport policies are having a major negative impact on tourism.

James Cherry, the president of Aéroports de Montréal (Montreal’s airport authority) said after the speech that governments still have an outdated notion that air travel is mainly for “rich people” and that it’s all right to use it as a “cash cow rather than as a catalyst for economic development.”

In his speech, Mr. Bisignani warned that 2011 will be a “challenging” year for the world’s commercial air carriers. “Profits will drop by 40 per cent to $9.1-billion (U.S.), which will mean a 1.5-per-cent margin.” Even last year’s record profit of $15.1-billion represented only a 2.7-per-cent margin on revenue of $565-billion, he said.

On the security front, he said it’s crucial that more effort be put into using government intelligence to target individuals who should be more closely inspected at airport checkpoints. “We must use the intelligence from government and airline sources to match checks with the passenger’s risk level.”

Mr. Bisignani, whose term ends in June, said his long-term vision is for “hassle-free tunnels of technology” in which passengers would be identified with their fingerprint, biometric passport and bar-coded boarding pass on their mobile devices. After being assessed, they would walk through a high-tech tunnel that checks for all forms of security risks without the need for unpacking, undressing or pat-downs.