Volaris Applies For US Route Licences

Mexican low-cost carrier Volaris has made a formal application to the US Department of Transportation (DOT) to inaugurate flights on 23 routes between Mexico and the United States. The airline, formed in March 2006 already holds a 15.9 per cent share of the domestic market but is now targeting the US for growth following the collapse of Mexicana last year. Volaris already offers flights to Los Angeles (from GDL, MLM, TLC and ZCL) and to Chicago Midway, Oakland and San Jose from Guadalajara. From March it will add Las Vegas to its network and according to the DOT filing Volaris is now seeking to serve Dallas, Fresno, Miami and Sacremento.

Subject to approval, the first new route will be Guadalajara – Fresno, which according to Volaris will begin “immediately after approval of this application,” followed by Aguascalientes – Los Angeles; Guadalajara – San Francisco; Guadalajara – Sacramento; Mexico City – Oakland and Zacatecas – Chicago. Other routes included in the application comprise links from Cancun to Chicago, Los Angeles, Miami and New York; Leon/Bajio to Oakland, San Jose and Sacramento; Mazatlan to Los Angeles; Mexico City to Dallas; Oaxaca to Los Angeles; Puerto Vallarta to Chicago, Los Angeles and San Francisco; San Jose del Cabo to Los Angeles and Sacramento; and Zihuatanejo to Los Angeles. Volaris already has Mexican Government approval to serve each of these routes and said it will inaugurate flights “as warranted by commercial conditions”.

During the analysis period Volaris was scheduled to operate 944 weekly flights, providing over 135,000 seats to the market. As the table below illustrates, its primary market is Tijuana’s General Abelardo L Rodríguez International Airport followed by Guadalajara Don Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla International and then its base at Toluca Licenciado Adolfo Lopez Mateos International.

Source: Flightbase (February 14-20, 2011)

The ambitious expansion plans of Volaris could be impacted by the return of Mexicana to the market. The latest incarnation of the airline has completed a series of certification flights and is confident that it will receive approval to relaunch services before the end of this month. It has a much more streamlined fleet than previously with just six Airbus A320s but plans to grow to more than 40 units by the end of the year. The revived entity likely to focus on major trunk routes from Mexico City serving cities such as Chicago, Los Angeles, Miami and Washington in the US; Toronto in Canada and some destinations across Central America and Caribbean, with high frequency services. This will mean it will be eager to keep hold of as many slots as possible at Mexico City and could restrict the growth plans of Volaris there, as well as at Guadalajara as the bilateral agreement between Mexico and the US restricts city-pair operations to just two operators from each country.