Canadians have more ways to fly to sun destinations this winter. My travel notebook for today also looks at how the Toronto International Film Festival might impact the city’s tourism, how Canadian airports are faring with delays, and more mixed news about world business travel recovery.
SWOOP ADDS MORE SUN
Swoop, which bills itself as Canada’s leading ultra-low-cost airline, today announced that it’s expanding its winter sun-flying offering from John C. Munro Hamilton International Airport with new non-stop service to Fort Lauderdale and Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic.
Swoop will begin its ultra-affordable flying to Fort Lauderdale on December 16, 2022, with one-way fares starting as low as $109 CAD, and to Punta Cana on January 11, 2023, with one-way fares starting as low as $199 CAD.
“As summer comes to an end, residents of southern Ontario are turning their attention towards winter travel planning with their sights set on a sunny getaway,” said Hamilton-based Regional Sales Lead, Meghan Miller “We know that Hamiltonians value the convenience of their local airport, and so we’re thrilled to offer more choice of ultra-convenient and ultra-affordable flights to popular sun destinations for winter vacations.”
Swoop has increased frequencies on existing sun-flying routes from Hamilton, with more weekly flights to Cancun, Las Vegas, Orlando, and St. Pete-Clearwater. In addition, several summer routes to Atlantic Canada saw such strong performance that the leading ULCC has extended service to year-round. Swoop will continue to operate non-stop flights from Hamilton to Moncton, NB (YQM) and St. John’s, NL (YYT) through the winter.
AIR CANADA AND WEST JET: FLIGHTS TO FORT MYERS
TravelWeeek reports that it will be easy for Canadians to get to Fort Myers, Florida this fall and winter, with two of Canada’s biggest airlines offering nonstop service.
Air Canada will operate nonstop daily service seven days a week, with four flights operating per day, from Toronto to Fort Myers from Oct. 30, 2022 to April 15, 2023. Air Canada will have two nonstop flights (Saturday and Sunday) from Montreal until Nov. 24 before gradually increasing to five flights per week (Monday, Wednesday ,Thursday, Saturday and Sunday) until April 15, 2023.
WestJet will has nonstop daily service seven days a week, with two flights per day from Toronto to Fort Myers starting from Oct. 24, 2022 to April 29, 2023. WestJet also will offer two weekly nonstop seasonal flights from Ottawa to Fort Myers from October 31, 2022 until April 29, 2023.
CANADIAN AIRPORT DELAYS EASE A LITTLE
According to the website flightaware.com, Canadian airports are improving as we ease past the Labour Day weekend. The site states that Tuesday, September 6 saw 31% of outgoing flights delayed at Toronto Pearson. That compares to 27% at Montreal-Trudeau, 25% in Halifax, 20% in Vancouver, and nine per cent in Calgary.
Flight Aware counts a flight as delayed if it’s more than 15 minutes late in departing.
The numbers are better, but there’s obviously a good deal of room for improvement.
Toronto sign at the CN Tower. JIM BYERS PHOTO
TIFF IMPACT ON TORONTO
It may not be up to pre-pandemic levels, but Toronto restaurant and bar owners are counting on a boost from this year’s Toronto International Film Festival. Canadian Press reports that roughly 3,500 industry participants and 1,400 members of the media – about what the event attracted prior to 2020 – will descend on the city this week. TIFF runs from tomorrow, September 8, to the 18th.
U.S. TRAVELLERS FRUSTRATED BY SUMMER SERVICE BUT STILL LOOKING TO TRAVEL
The latest “State of the American Traveler” report from Destination Analysts shows that 62% of American travelers took at least one overnight trip between mid-May and mid-August.
That’s the good news. But 31% of those American travellers who reported moderate to extreme levels of frustration with the service issues they experienced on their recent trips said they’re reconsidering their Fall travel plans due to these frustrations. In addition, crowds/too many people traveling (17%) and the possibility of flight cancellations were among the top 10 travel deterrents Americans cited for why they didn’t travel more in the past few months.
Despite the challenges facing travel, nearly two-thirds of American travelers still expect to take at least one overnight leisure trip in the next three months. Currently, 29% of American travelers say they have a leisure trip planned in September and 30% have a leisure trip planned in October—on the rise since last month. Looking further ahead, a growing number of Americans say they are open to travel inspiration (68%) and are increasingly excited about their travel in the future (80%).
Business travellers. Rob Wilson/Unsplash Photo
WORLD BIZ TRAVEL: OUTLOOK STILL MURKY
Airlines around the world were overwhelmed with leisure travellers this summer. But the outlook for business travel remains mixed. The Global Business Travel Association has said biz travel around the world may not rebound to pre-pandemic levels until 2026.
“The whole challenge for the industry is around the return of the corporate traveller, and whether he is going to come back in enough volume and frequency that is going to help these airlines,” John Grant, an analyst with travel-data provider OAG, said in a story posted at Travel Industry Today.
