Airport reaps the rewards of its extensive upgrade as Krasair enthuses over its prospects and confirms new winter schedule (705 words)

Published: 10/5/2001

Following the announcement on 4th October of the move by Krasnoyarsk Airlines (Krasair) to Domodedovo Airport, Boris Abramovich, General Director of Krasair, and Sergey Rudakov, General Director of Domodedovo Airport, have signed an agreement sealing the deal. Abramovich commented that Krasair had in the past operated all its flights from Domodedovo, but three years ago moved 80% of its flights from Domodedovo to Sheremetyevo, given poor services at Domodedovo prior to its recently completed extensive upgrading. Now, Abramovich considers it to be the airport offering the highest level of service in Moscow. In fact, he thinks Krasair is moving "just in time", on the grounds that six months down the line, the good slots would have been taken by other carriers: no doubt music to the ears of the airport's management controlled by the East Line Group, as it negotiates with other airlines, reportedly including British Airways and Lufthansa. In contrast to the statements made by Transaero at the time of its move, Abramovich was reluctant to expand on the reasons for the move beyond the positive appeal of Domodedovo, clearly in an effort to remain on good terms with Sheremetyevo. He would only say that Sheremetyevo lacked capacity, but that some of the airline's charter flights would continue to operate from there. Rudakov for his part seemed somewhat overwhelmed by Abramovich's fulsome praise, but said that Domodedovo's goal was to be the best in Moscow, as well as providing the right mix of flights to make it an efficient hub: “We don't want to serve 20 flights to Krasnoyarsk and one flight to Sochi”. Rudakov added that the upgrading of the airport is continuing and by April 2001 the international flights area will have grown three fold, with separated departure and arrival areas, and six sky bridges. He also said that as the airport's business expanded, the space available allowed easy growth. However, he made it clear that the airport was opposed to a second terminal on the grounds that it would detract from the airport's easy transit for passengers passing through the airport. In Domodedovo, transit passengers simply walk from international flights area to the domestic flights area. According to Rudakov, the airport is currently completing the reconstruction of station at Domodedovo and the station and the airport will be under the same roof by November 2001. New trains will take just 42 minutes to travel to Paveletsky Station in central Moscow, compared to the current hour-long journey. The reduction in journey time is attributable to a joint project between the airport and the Ministry of Railways, which involved rail repairs to allow higher speeds. The trains will go every hour and in summer every 30 minutes. By the end of 2002, passengers will be able to check-in at Paveletsky Railway Station. Abramovich said that the airline's winter schedule was due to start on 8th October and would last until 15th May 2002, with Krasnoyarsk Airport and Domodedovo Airport as the main transit points. The new schedule will incorporate the airline's experience with what they called a “fan” schedule used during the summer schedule at Krasnoyarsk and aimed at coordinating early morning and evening arrivals and departures to maximize transit business. Abramovich said that, under the fan schedule, passengers wait only 1-1.5 hours in Krasnoyarsk to change flight and are not required to recover their baggage. The shorter waiting times have been optimized by two years of research into the dynamics of the airline's traffic, which the airlines believes resulted in the increase in traffic in the summer season of 30%. Attributing the total rise in traffic at Russia's fourth largest carrier to such finetuning seems a little enthusiastic, but Krasair's passengers can now fly to 16 cities in the Far East, Siberia and Korea via Krasnoyarsk from Moscow and plans to carry 1.1 m passengers in 2001 or 51% more than in 2000 (726,516) according to Abramovich. Interestingly, the company's spokesperson, Svetlana Volodina, did not see access to an international carrier at Domodoedovo as being important for the airline, given its focus on passengers from Russian East to Russian West and passengers from Siberia and Far East flying charter flights to popular resorts.

Article ID: 2806