Sensational-Adelaide.com

Air levies make us too costly to visit

http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/ipad/air- ... 6070577946

INTERNATIONAL airlines are paying more than two and a half times as much to fly into Adelaide.

The State Government and Adelaide Airport Ltd have asked for these Federal Government levies to be reduced because they discourage airlines from servicing the state, and result in increased ticket prices.

Airlines pay an average of $4788 in government taxes for an A333 flight to Adelaide compared with other Australian capital cities. The cheapest capital, Melbourne, is at $1864, and the average at $2791.

Transport Minister Pat Conlon said he had written to the Productivity Commission about the charges.

"The Airservices Australia charges heavily disadvantage relatively low volume airports like Adelaide and are more than double the average of the other airports," he said.

Mr Conlon's letter indicates he is supportive of the proposal from Adelaide Airport Limited.

"The preferred position endorsed by the SA Government is for a return to network charging (parity with other airports)," he said.

The high taxes disadvantage Adelaide because they are factored into airline decisions about how many flights to bring in to the city.

Combined with airport charges, an international airline flying an A333 in and out of Adelaide would pay out $15,662 compared to the least expensive airport, which is Melbourne, at $10,346.

AAL general manager of corporate affairs John McArdle said the company's passenger charges were in the mid range of that charged by other capital city airports.

"However, the charges set by Airservices Australia are considerably higher than any other capital city airport, and two-and-a-half times higher than Sydney on a comparable international flight turnaround," he said.

"The State Government has supported our view that Airservices Australia's charges are inequitable and hinder our ability to attract new airlines and more flights."

Mr Conlon, in his letter to the Productivity Commission, also states that while the State Government has a good working relationship with the airport operators, it was "concerned" with developments on the site of the airport putting pressure on road infrastructure outside the airport which had to be upgraded at taxpayer expense.

Under normal circumstances, developers upgrade roadworks outside the limits of their developments resulting from increased traffic flow.

"In the past this has removed the government's ability to require the developer to fund the upgrading of an adjacent off-airport road intersection made necessary by the proposed development," Mr Conlon states.

Longer SA stays for foreign visitors

http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/sout ... 6070521495

INTERNATIONAL visitors to South Australia have increased in number and are staying longer.

They're also spending more money when here.

Tourism Minister John Rau said yesterday's International Visitor Survey figures for the 12 months ended March showed spending by overseas travellers in SA had been up 10 per cent, compared with a national 3 per cent average.

"Being up $71 million is a massive boost to the local economy," he said

...

The higher Airservices charges were an important factor – “but not the only factor” – in moves to bring more overseas and domestic services to Adelaide.

The operator has been working hard to attract more overseas airlines to Adelaide, including Emirates and Etihad, which are still high on its agenda, as well as Asian carriers such as China Southern, Thai International and Vietnam Airlines.

Its only success so far has been the introduction of a handful of Vietnam Airlines charters, which are expected to be repeated this summer.

“We are discussing RPT services with Vietnam Airlines, and we‘re in close discussions with China Southern,” he said.

New aircraft deliveries to the Chinese carrier could be a key to obtaining a direct service through Adelaide.

However, none of the potential airline candidates had committed to Adelaide services yet.

Meanwhile, Adelaide Airport’s new road system is due to open on July 28, enabling work to begin on the planned multi-storey car park to replace the present open-air car park and provide spaces for 2000 vehicles. This will more than double the present short-term spaces, and give direct, covered access to the terminal. The work is part of a $100 million project to upgrade the airport.

Solutions driven while computing on-the-fly

* Jennifer Foreshew
* From: The Australian
* June 07, 2011 12:00AM

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/austral ... 6069742797

ADELAIDE Airport IT manager Philip Dewhurst was bitten by the travel bug before taking on his current role. But cheap or free airfares aren't a perk of the job.

"We pay like everybody else," Dewhurst says. "We are completely agnostic, for obvious reasons."

The married father-of-two, who spent almost 20 years with Coca-Cola, joined Adelaide Airport more than three years ago.

"With Coke, I started as a junior programmer and worked my way through the ranks," he says. "I really did start in the days of paper tape and punched cards."

Dewhurst, who has been in IT for almost 40 years, has worked in New Zealand, Indonesia, South Africa, India and the US during his career.

His responsibilities at Adelaide Airport include the data and voice network, technology infrastructure, helpdesk, digital signage, data security, service provider contracts (in particular for the T1 Terminal) as well as the procurement of technology solutions. There is a separate group looking after business systems.

"We are not leading edge in aviation," says Dewhurst, who is a keen traveller as well as sailor. "You have got to put in your fairly well-tried and true systems."

The small IT team consists of about a dozen people, including four direct reports and third-party service contract staff. Dewhurst would like to boost this by one or two extra staff.

"A lot of our work is around the government-required master plan," Dewhurst says. "We put out a master plan every five years."

Adelaide Airport's current IT projects include working with the airlines on their new passenger experiences, including check-in, departure and/or baggage movement. "We did a lot of work with Qantas on their next-generation check-in, where you have your kiosks and your self-bag drop," he says.

Other work includes refreshing digital signage at the airport for flight information and advertising, server virtualisation, a new multi-deck carpark and mobile workforce.

"Our airport duty managers need to be keeping an eye on where aircraft are going to be parked, because there could be changes at any minute," Dewhurst says. "However, if they are not in the office they have got to race back and get to their computer. But if they have a mobile device they can do it on-the-fly, literally."

Dewhurst is unable to discuss the implementation of body scanner technology at the airport.

He admits security, generally, is the biggest issue his team faces. "When we look at our stats, as far as viruses and spam, it chews up an enormous amount of our resources and our time even though we have systems in place. It still needs to be monitored, maintained and kept up-to-date."

Dewhurst says that security is ramped up every year. "We have systems in place and hardware in place, but the baddies are always finding different ways," he says. "They try to hack into the system, sending viruses through in denials of service attacks. We can just physically see it all the time - they are banging at the door."

Another challenge is demand from staff to introduce different mobile devices. "We are very security minded," Dewhurst says. "So physical security, data security, network security and anything to do with security we are very tough on it."

But Dewhurst sees connectivity for wireless devices as a hot topic for many years to come. Adelaide Airport is also looking at new tablet devices.

muzzamo wrote:Diversions into Adelaide yesterday.

If only AirAsia could fly out of adelaide permanently. Even if it was only 1 flight a week, I would be happy.

... MORE FLIGHTS BETWEEN AUSTRALIA AND INDONESIA

The Gillard Labor Government has signed a new Memorandum of Understanding which almost doubles the number of flights which can be operated between Australia and Indonesia.

This is good news for Australians looking for more competitive fares to destinations like Bali and Jakarta. It’s also a boost for our tourism industry and economy as it improves access to Australia for Indonesian tourists, students and business travellers.

In the 12 months to April this year, more than 1.8 million people travelled between Australia and Indonesia.

This important market has been growing at an average of 32 per cent every year over the past three years.

It is important that our aviation services keep up with the strong growth in demand for travel between our two nations.

Effective immediately, this deal increases the capacity available for services to and from Australia to up to 27,500 seats each way, each week – an 86 per cent increase on current capacity of 14,800 seats.

The deal includes:

· Up to 25,000 seats a week for airlines of each nation travelling to and from Australia’s major ‘gateway’ destinations (Sydney, Melbourne, Perth and Brisbane) each way, every week;

· Up to 2,500 additional seats a week on routes into and out of Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth as long as those additional flights make stopovers at a regional international airport such as Adelaide, Darwin or Cairns; and

· A fully open code share framework which will allow airlines of both sides to offer consumers more choice and competition through cooperative arrangements with other airlines to broaden their networks.

bm7500 wrote:Some potential good news from Cathay Pacific. (I say potential as i'm currently trying to verify it)

For those of you who are not aware, Cathay currently operate a Triangular route from Hong Kong to Melbourne via Adelaide. This is known in the transport industry as 'Cabotage'. From October this looks to change on some days.

Splashmo wrote:ABC News tonight reported that the State Government will seek to recoup the $2m they invested in Tiger for basing four aircraft here, because of obvious violations of the contract.