Latest / 360 with Katie Woolf / Katie Woolf spoke with Aviation Development Manager Allan Woo from the Airport Development Group

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Katie Woolf spoke with Aviation Development Manager Allan Woo from the Airport Development Group · 360 with Katie Woolf

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Now let's head across right now, a real change of pace.
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  Speaker 1: And joining us on the line is Alan Wu, the
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  Speaker 1: Aviation Development Manager at the Airport Development Group. Good morning
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  Speaker 1: to you Allan, Good morning Katie. Great to have you
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  Speaker 1: on the show now. Alan, we know yesterday Virgin Australia
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  Speaker 1: that new route between Adelaide and dal and a touchdown.
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  Speaker 1: How did it all go?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, it went well. It's amazing to have all three
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  Speaker 2: carriers operating, all three mainline carriers operating on that route
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  Speaker 2: and giving choice. And now the territories have a choice
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  Speaker 2: to leave either midday or around around dinner time, so
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  Speaker 2: you know, leave work at four twenty one, then you're
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  Speaker 2: in on Flinders Street in time for late dinner.
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  Speaker 1: And what does it mean in terms of the number
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  Speaker 1: of number of seats per week that we've actually got
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  Speaker 1: now to Adelaide.
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  Speaker 2: So it is an increase of about five to six
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  Speaker 2: in seats per week. And so what that means is
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  Speaker 2: about fifteen to twenty percent increase in available seats compared
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  Speaker 2: to August the last month.
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  Speaker 1: And Alan, I've no doubt that you know that this
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  Speaker 1: is a really positive move in terms of increasing that capacity,
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  Speaker 1: but in terms of enabling Territorians to travel away to
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  Speaker 1: South Australia to see their family or to go on
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  Speaker 1: a holiday. Again.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, look, it's just more access to the hotspots down
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  Speaker 2: in South Australia like Kangaroo Island and Brassa Valley. And
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  Speaker 2: it was unique and this is quite quite common for
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  Speaker 2: in the first week of operations is versions offering a
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  Speaker 2: great one way fair, so as low as one hundred
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  Speaker 2: and nineteen dollars and I dare say you'll never see
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  Speaker 2: a fair that low again.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, that is very cheap, and especially when you compare
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  Speaker 1: it to how expensive it is in some cases to
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  Speaker 1: to go to other locations Alan. How much of a
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  Speaker 1: juggle is it for the Airport Development Group at this
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  Speaker 1: point in time with the different lockdowns happening in other states?
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  Speaker 1: So I know that obviously we've got two of our
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  Speaker 1: major markets at the moment in lockdown in Victoria and
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  Speaker 1: also in New South Wales. How much of a juggle
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  Speaker 1: is it for you to sort of be able to
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  Speaker 1: make sure that there are still different locations around Australia
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  Speaker 1: where people can travel to.
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  Speaker 2: What we've seen is the demand for travel domestically has
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  Speaker 2: rebound quite quickly when the hotspots are lifted and so
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  Speaker 2: our focus is on maintaining and even growing and the
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  Speaker 2: evidence of it that the definitions and where there is
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  Speaker 2: free travel and look, I'm confident that once the restrictions
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  Speaker 2: have eased in Victoria, Act and New South Wales that
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  Speaker 2: demand will bounce back quite quickly as well.
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  Speaker 1: How are you going at the airport at the moment
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  Speaker 1: when it comes to you know that capacity and what
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  Speaker 1: we're operating.
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  Speaker 2: At definitely lower than pre COVID. But in terms of
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  Speaker 2: our comparing ourselves to other Australian ports, we are doing
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  Speaker 2: quite well. We're we've proven have quite a robust aviation
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  Speaker 2: sector and driven off by a lot of the fly
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  Speaker 2: flile traffic that that that is requiring the need for travel. Still,
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  Speaker 2: so when we look at our market compared to other
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  Speaker 2: or are specifically our business market compared to other markets,
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  Speaker 2: is that you can't fix a piece of mining equipment
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  Speaker 2: over a zoom call. So that you know that propping
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  Speaker 2: up and keeping some of our demand and our capacity
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  Speaker 2: in the market and are you having to.
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  Speaker 1: Be pretty agile in the sense that you know, like
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  Speaker 1: you said, some of those different locations I in New
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  Speaker 1: South Wales and Victoria right now are in the situation
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  Speaker 1: that they're in. But you know, once things do sort
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  Speaker 1: of change and those lockdowns lift and those hot spots left,
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  Speaker 1: it seems as though you guys have got to be
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  Speaker 1: pretty fast then in making sure that you know that
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  Speaker 1: there are that there are flights available for territorians or
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  Speaker 1: for people in those locations to be able to get
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  Speaker 1: here to the territory.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's exactly Ryan. So it's when you say agiles,
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  Speaker 2: it's very much an agile the discussion with the airlines
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  Speaker 2: and the airport. So there for us as we're managing
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  Speaker 2: our infrastructure and our slots and our available capacity, and
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  Speaker 2: the airlines are making decisions much quicker than they ever
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  Speaker 2: have before. So in both in both manners, so when
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  Speaker 2: there's a hot spot declared that the capacity generally stays
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  Speaker 2: on immediately because there's a high demand for people to
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  Speaker 2: get back home. But then on on the flip side
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  Speaker 2: and where we're in it recently with Darwin with the
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  Speaker 2: launch of Canbra Darwin and in this case to Adelaide
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  Speaker 2: that the decision maker from the airlines is very very
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  Speaker 2: quick and typically the the the lea time from announcement
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  Speaker 2: of a new route to its actually commencing is many
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  Speaker 2: many weeks, where in this case is a handful of
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  Speaker 2: weeks for this route.
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  Speaker 1: And Alan, are you and I spoke not too long
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  Speaker 1: ago about that possibility of a London Darwin direct flight
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  Speaker 1: you just touched on Canberra. Then we know that you
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  Speaker 1: know the increased capacity here for Adelaide as well as
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  Speaker 1: something that was that was announced yesterday. Are there any
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  Speaker 1: other sort of new routes or any other new locations
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  Speaker 1: that we could be able to fly direct to from
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  Speaker 1: Darwin at some point in the near future on the cards.
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  Speaker 2: The opportunities are in front of us. Certainly that from
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  Speaker 2: our perspective, we're starting to see it. Later then the
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  Speaker 2: Tunnel wants to get more understanding of government decisions on
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  Speaker 2: free movement of travel. We see that agility that we
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  Speaker 2: mentioned before from the airlines that will translate into new
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  Speaker 2: new routes. We're working very hard on seeing that to
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  Speaker 2: become a reality for Darwin. So not sure where those
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  Speaker 2: could be, but there is very dependent on a lot
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  Speaker 2: of moving factors at the moment. So you know, our
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  Speaker 2: our free movement to travel, and then other countries you
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  Speaker 2: know free movement to travel as well, So it's really
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  Speaker 2: identifying where there was where there's alignments between the two regions.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, oh Alan, good stuff. Good to catch up with
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  Speaker 1: you this morning. And that's certainly good news I reckon
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  Speaker 1: for top enders or for us here in the Northern Territory,
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  Speaker 1: I will too fly will that increased capacity, I think
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  Speaker 1: for Adelaide to Darwin, it's it's certainly a good thing.
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  Speaker 1: So we really appreciate you coming on the show this
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  Speaker 1: morning and having a bit of a chat about it.
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  Speaker 2: Oh, thank you, and have a good rest of your day,
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  Speaker 2: Kittie you two.
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  Speaker 1: That's Alan Wu there, the Aviation Development manager out at
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  Speaker 1: the airport Development