This lone flight between Chennai and Salem has huge demand now
Posted on: 24/Dec/2018 10:28:18 AM
Every day there is a flight operating from Chennai to Salem and back to Chennai and this flight has been there around the past 6 months. This flight was launched under Udan scheme is well known. The occupancy rate is 78% for the 72-seater flight and its fares are high. The news is there is an increase in the fares during the festival holidays and during the weekends as more people use this flight to travel from Chennai city to Salem. It must be noted that this one way ticket was sold for Rs 7000 for travel on 22nd of December and Rs 4000 for travel on 23rd of December.
On Monday, 24th December, the starting fare is Rs 4699 and it hovers between Rs 2599 and Rs 3700 for the rest of the days. It is brought out that this fare is lower than the last week because Friday and Saturday were popular days of travel for Christmas weekend. Once the 50 percent of the seats that have a fare cap of Rs 2500 is sold up, then the fare increases and the remaining seats could be sold at market rates. If the ticket is booked 10 days in advance then the fare is in the range of Rs 2000 to Rs 3000. The information as per AAI or Airport Authority of India is the flight has been successful due to the high seat occupancy. Amazing piece of information is other airlines have not shown interest to operate their flights inspite of the huge demand.
The important objective of Udan is to open up an unserved or under served airport with subsidies so that the airlines would be encouraged to operate more flights. It must be taken into account that the Udan flights to other important cities like Thanjavur, Vellore, Neyveli etc are yet to take off.
As per Mr. Basheer ahmed of Metro Travels, there is more demand for travel from businessmen, families including wedding guests etc on the Chennai to Salem route. He spoke about how people from Delhi and Mumbai come down to Chennai and used flights to reach Salem quicker. The amazing news is during the festival time the one way ticket prices reach Rs 10000 also. An official belonging to airlines pointed out that selling tickets at higher rates or without a cap might not work in the long run in this short route that could be covered by in less than 5 hours by road. For Udan scheme, AAI now considers Salem a success story.
A tweet message from AAI headquarters stated that this 50 min Salem- Chennai-Salem route has been tremendous in boosting the industrial development and this with more than 78% PLF or passenger load factor. The message also thanked Udan for its affordable pricing and pointed out that local businessmen could expand their business and migrant workers could stay connected with their families easily. Between the financial year 2014 and financial year 2019, airports of tier2 and tier 3 cities have observed rise in the domestic passengers share by more than 3 percent.
