Tourism Minister welcomes Jetstar's increased air capacity to Cairns
Jetstar's announcement that it will further expand its domestic capacity to Cairns by almost 30 percent from early 2011 is great news for tourism in Tropical North Queensland, Tourism Minister Peter Lawlor said today.
Mr Lawlor said Jetstar had today announced additional daily services from Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane and would build to a daily return Gold Coast - Cairns service.
"This announcement will contribute more than 4425 additional seats to the region's domestic capacity each week and represents an additional 25 weekly return services to Cairns," Mr Lawlor said.
"It will also help link Japan and other key international markets between two popular Queensland leisure destinations.
"It represents Jetstar's single largest injection of new domestic flights for Cairns.
"I'd like to commend Jetstar on the confidence they've shown in the Tropical North Queensland tourism industry."
Mr Lawlor said Jetstar's announcement meant the airline would now be at a record operational capacity on Melbourne-Cairns and Sydney-Cairns routes and further complement Qantas on the largest Brisbane-Cairns market.
"Queensland shares a prosperous partnership with Jetstar, which is further strengthened by these services," he said.
"Earlier this year Jetstar grew Cairns operations by 18 extra weekly services, introducing flights from Perth, and more Adelaide, Melbourne and Sydney flights.
"Additionally, the airline also recently announced that it would operate a new Auckland-Cairns route three times a week from 12 April 2011 which represented a 47 percent increase in international seat capacity from New Zealand to Cairns."
Mr Lawlor said the State Government and Tourism Queensland were working together to make sure the tourism industry continued to receive the support it needed to recover and grow in the wake of tough times.
"The strength of Tropical North Queensland's tourism in dustry is in part reliant on the continued support of our aviation partners and we warmly welcome the Jetstar's announcement today," he said.
"I am sure the local tourism industry will join me in congratulating Jetstar on the introduction of these new services and lay out a warm welcome mat to our new visitors."
In the year ending March 2010 Tropical North Queensland welcomed approximately 1.5 million Australians, an increase of four percent on the previous year.
These visitors also spent approximately $1.8 billion on their visits, a 34 percent increase on the previous year.
25 August 2010
