PIA Planning to Start Two Weekly Flights for Paris After Getting EASA Permission

[Abbas Ali]

PIA intends to start twice-a-week service for Paris after getting clearance from European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) hopefully by the end of June/July this year, this was disclosed by CEO PIA Air Vice Marshal Muhammad Amir Hayat in live interaction session with Facebook users on May 13.

Abbas

[Amaad Lone]

Why would anyone fly twice a week when you can fly daily on other airlines.

[Karachi Aviator]

Most probably 1x from Lahore and 1x from Islamabad. Would be better to do both flights from a single station and start the other later on. Or maybe a triangular route like LHE-ISB-CDG with a 30-45 mins of stay on ground at ISB.

[faisal-777]

Most probably 1x from Lahore and 1x from Islamabad. Would be better to do both flights from a single station and start the other later on. Or maybe a triangular route like LHE-ISB-CDG with a 30-45 mins of stay on ground at ISB.

30-45 Min ground time sounds too less? that is normally a turnaround time for a narrow body jet from a LCC with low baggage to be loaded.

Instead PIA should offer bus-plane combination whereby passengers can be transferred from Lahore to Islamabad in spacious buses.

[Tuti Fruiti]

in the facebook session was there mention of European stations like Oslo, Copenhagen, Milan, Frankfurt etc other than Paris???

[A310]

Most probably 1x from Lahore and 1x from Islamabad. Would be better to do both flights from a single station and start the other later on. Or maybe a triangular route like LHE-ISB-CDG with a 30-45 mins of stay on ground at ISB.

30-45 Min ground time sounds too less? that is normally a turnaround time for a narrow body jet from a LCC with low baggage to be loaded.

Instead PIA should offer bus-plane combination whereby passengers can be transferred from Lahore to Islamabad in spacious buses.

Passengers would much rather prefer a layover in ME than taking a 4 hour bus journey.

[Tuti Fruiti]

Most probably 1x from Lahore and 1x from Islamabad. Would be better to do both flights from a single station and start the other later on. Or maybe a triangular route like LHE-ISB-CDG with a 30-45 mins of stay on ground at ISB.

30-45 Min ground time sounds too less? that is normally a turnaround time for a narrow body jet from a LCC with low baggage to be loaded.

Instead PIA should offer bus-plane combination whereby passengers can be transferred from Lahore to Islamabad in spacious buses.

Passengers would much rather prefer a layover in ME than taking a 4 hour bus journey.

absolutely...travelling by bus or road for long distance to catch plane *destroys* the very purpose of flying...and this is agony hundreds of thousands of Pakistani passengers face because there are not just enough flights or major airports are in few cities only..

[faisal-777]

Most probably 1x from Lahore and 1x from Islamabad. Would be better to do both flights from a single station and start the other later on. Or maybe a triangular route like LHE-ISB-CDG with a 30-45 mins of stay on ground at ISB.

30-45 Min ground time sounds too less? that is normally a turnaround time for a narrow body jet from a LCC with low baggage to be loaded.

Instead PIA should offer bus-plane combination whereby passengers can be transferred from Lahore to Islamabad in spacious buses.

Passengers would much rather prefer a layover in ME than taking a 4 hour bus journey.

absolutely...travelling by bus or road for long distance to catch plane *destroys* the very purpose of flying...and this is agony hundreds of thousands of Pakistani passengers face because there are not just enough flights or major airports are in few cities only..

Pakistani market is not that big enough to allow profitable operations from airports just 4h apart. Even here in Austria where presumably customer base has higher purchasing power, the Austrian Airlines offers rail-plane ticket from Salzburg to main hub Vienna with travel time around 4 hours. In Germany Emirates used to (not sure if still) sell tickets where last leg of journey was aboard a train.

Offer cheaper fares, i am pretty sure there are passengers who wouldn't mind saving few tens of thousands by doing a leg of journey via road.

[Amaad Lone]

PIA has three main hubs.

Lahore, Karachi and Islamabad.

Islamabad can feed cities like Peshawar and Sialkot.

Lahore can feed cities like Faisalabad, Gujranwala, Kasur, Sahiwal Sargodha

Karachi can feed cities in Sindh along with Multan.

PIA needs to operate aircraft like A321-271LR.
With 16/155 layout like TAP these planes will be ideal for routes to Europe and Far East flying from the three hubs minimum 4 weekly flights.

Rome-Milan
Paris
Amsterdam-Frankfurt
Oslo-Copenhagen
Barcelona
Istanbul

These 9 cities some being served as pairs.

In Far East

Singapore-Kuala Lumpur
Bangkok
Hong Kong
Beijing-Tokyo

Once again divide the traffic between the three hubs and operate smaller but long range aircraft.

We dont need the 777s anymore, they should be sold or converted to cargo.

For UK the aircraft should be A330-900 and for North America A330-800.

[faisal-777]

PIA has three main hubs.

Lahore, Karachi and Islamabad.

Islamabad can feed cities like Peshawar and Sialkot.

Lahore can feed cities like Faisalabad, Gujranwala, Kasur, Sahiwal Sargodha

Karachi can feed cities in Sindh along with Multan.

PIA needs to operate aircraft like A321-271LR.
With 16/155 layout like TAP these planes will be ideal for routes to Europe and Far East flying from the three hubs minimum 4 weekly flights.

Rome-Milan
Paris
Amsterdam-Frankfurt
Oslo-Copenhagen
Barcelona
Istanbul

These 9 cities some being served as pairs.

In Far East

Singapore-Kuala Lumpur
Bangkok
Hong Kong
Beijing-Tokyo

Once again divide the traffic between the three hubs and operate smaller but long range aircraft.

We dont need the 777s anymore, they should be sold or converted to cargo.

For UK the aircraft should be A330-900 and for North America A330-800.

Sorry but why would people fly narrow body aircraft when ME3 offers widebody jets for these routes? I have flown Europe-ME legs two times on narrow body (aboard QR and partner of EY) - honestly if fare difference is not big, i would opt for flight aboard widebody.

Putting a narrow body on a route suited for widebodies is a negative marketing. PIA should look for A330 or Dreamliners

[Tuti Fruiti]

Most probably 1x from Lahore and 1x from Islamabad. Would be better to do both flights from a single station and start the other later on. Or maybe a triangular route like LHE-ISB-CDG with a 30-45 mins of stay on ground at ISB.

30-45 Min ground time sounds too less? that is normally a turnaround time for a narrow body jet from a LCC with low baggage to be loaded.

Instead PIA should offer bus-plane combination whereby passengers can be transferred from Lahore to Islamabad in spacious buses.

Passengers would much rather prefer a layover in ME than taking a 4 hour bus journey.

absolutely...travelling by bus or road for long distance to catch plane *destroys* the very purpose of flying...and this is agony hundreds of thousands of Pakistani passengers face because there are not just enough flights or major airports are in few cities only..

Pakistani market is not that big enough to allow profitable operations from airports just 4h apart. Even here in Austria where presumably customer base has higher purchasing power, the Austrian Airlines offers rail-plane ticket from Salzburg to main hub Vienna with travel time around 4 hours. In Germany Emirates used to (not sure if still) sell tickets where last leg of journey was aboard a train.

Offer cheaper fares, i am pretty sure there are passengers who wouldn't mind saving few tens of thousands by doing a leg of journey via road.

i wud say that Austria is very small country both interms of geography and population..its roughly one third size of punjab province and population 90 lakh..while Pakistan is 26 crore people and size of Turkey with 8 lakh square kilometer.. people in pakistan do have alot of money to make air travel ... Pakistani people have been deprived of aviation making them falsely believe that aviation is unnecessary and one can travel by road..this is totally wrong..there are 100 of reasons where air travel is necessity and not a luxury.. europe has built in high speed rail network but european coutnries have dense airport network as well.. Pakistan need dense airport network and lots of regional flights and international to connect the country both domestically and internationally..offcourse, if someone want to travel by road or train thats personal choice but people deserve option of air travel...

[Karachi Aviator]

If PIA is to operate to a single hub within EU and offer connections to the rest of the region and even North America for now out of that hub, then wide body operations make more sense.

But if PIA wants to go for the same strategy which it had before the ban of operating to multiple destinations such as Barcelona, Paris, Oslo, Copenhagen and Milan, then narrow body makes more sense.

In both cases, PIA doesn't have the aircrafts which are suitable for EU operations, neither the wide bodies nor the narrow bodies.

I personally think PIA should make a single hub within EU and offer codeshared flights to the rest of the EU because at max, how many destinations would PIA be able to fly to in EU? Even if the above 5 destinations are flown to, there are still many stations like Berlin, Rome, Athens, Munich, Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Madrid etc which PIA won't be able to cover.

For now PIA should operate at least 8x weekly into Paris, 4 each for Lahore and Islamabad and revive the interline agreement with Air France.

[faisal-777]

If PIA is to operate to a single hub within EU and offer connections to the rest of the region and even North America for now out of that hub, then wide body operations make more sense.

But if PIA wants to go for the same strategy which it had before the ban of operating to multiple destinations such as Barcelona, Paris, Oslo, Copenhagen and Milan, then narrow body makes more sense.

In both cases, PIA doesn't have the aircrafts which are suitable for EU operations, neither the wide bodies nor the narrow bodies.

I personally think PIA should make a single hub within EU and offer codeshared flights to the rest of the EU because at max, how many destinations would PIA be able to fly to in EU? Even if the above 5 destinations are flown to, there are still many stations like Berlin, Rome, Athens, Munich, Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Madrid etc which PIA won't be able to cover.

For now PIA should operate at least 8x weekly into Paris, 4 each for Lahore and Islamabad and revive the interline agreement with Air France.

That is basically what was tried back around 2010 with an extensive codesharing involving TK. We all know how it ended.