News
Banished from Bandung
June 21st 2019
Indonesian government orders 28 daily flights moved to white elephant airport three hours away. Read More »
Expanding international flights and regional connectivity are the purported reasons for the Indonesian government’s ruling that 28 daily domestic flights across 13 routes move from Bandung’s conveniently located Husein Sastranegara International Airport to the white elephant West Java International Airport in Kertajati by July 1. The airport opened in 2018.
Ground transfer time from West Java International to Bandung could be three hours, and licenses have been issued for new bus, minibus and shuttle services, according to the Jakarta Post.
The flights are domestic services to other parts of Indonesia, including Bali Denpasar and Medan. Bandung will continue to handle regional flights within Java and existing international flights.
It is hoped the move will grow international services, but there has been no news about traffic right allocations. The Jakarta Globe said the decision was a face-saving tactic for the government, as West Java International was projected to be the country’s largest airport after Jakarta’s Soekarno-Hatta, but has instead had few flights, “prompting many embarrassing images and headlines on local media”.
West Java’s initial handling capacity is five million passengers a year with a design capacity of 29.3 million passengers per annum, the Jakarta Globe wrote. Flightglobal cited Cirium data that showed many of the affected routes are only flown by Lion Air.
