Ryanair expansion to and from Italy

ITALY (eTN) – Ryanair announced that by November, seven new routes from Rome Ciampino Airport to six European destinations (Bordeaux, Marseille, Poznan, Wroclaw, Manchester and Leipzig) and Italy (Genoa), with the fixed positioning of an eighth flight to Rome: This massive new effort – which means an investment of 500 million dollars – “will bring traffic to and from Rome to an estimated 4.5 million passengers, providing more than 2 million tourists and creating around 4,500 jobs.” And, to celebrate the launch of new routes from Ciampino Ryanair offered 1 million seats at € 9.99, available until July 28.|

This was announced by Michael O’Leary, who reiterated that Ciampino “will never be closed, nor reduced [have] capacity.” He added: “This year, Ryanair will strengthen its leadership position in Europe with 75 million passengers – more than twice that of users of Air France – and will celebrate the passing of Alitalia in the transport to and from Italy, with an estimated final balance 2011 over 25 million passengers, and will settle on AZ 23 million.

“We are now the clear demonstration that low-cost means winning strategy, at all latitudes. We have the best performance of the aviation world for several years; we have a fleet of over 270 aircraft, with an average year[ly] of 40 new aircraft purchased, and constant reinvestment in the fleet today is around 8 billion dollars. In addition, we invest about US$270 million for training of personnel and the maintenance of high levels of security, already guaranteed by the fact that the average age of our machine is only 3 years.”

Strengthening in Italy
O’Leary then focused on the current performance of the carrier. In the summer season, 180 airports served 27 countries, with more than 1,300 routes and approximately 1,500 daily departures guaranteed. The Flying Irish – as it was dubbed at home – has also confirmed a future strengthening of the presence of Ryanair in Italy, which currently boasts 22 airports served, over 360 routes, with the goal of 25 million passengers and nearly 25,000 new jobs work.

“Compared to the new Alitalia,” added the aggressive O’Leary, who collects strikes, delays, high fees, and oversees markets from the protection of a government bill, “Ryanair continues to grow while maintaining a punctuality of 93% it persues a policy of strong growth on Italy, which provide[s] the country a good prospect of growth in tourism; in 2011, we opened 62 new routes and for the foreseeable futuwe want to enhance strategic areas for tourism in Apulia, Calabria, Sicily, with possible new routes to Catania and Palermo, and Sardinia, with new flights to Alghero and Cagliari.”