Business travel

Choice Hotel Europe has just welcomed a new Comfort hotel not far from Paris. The Comfort Hotel Villepinte-Sevran has 48 rooms, a breakfast room and a seminar room. A practical two-star address for participants in events organised at the Villepinte Exhibition Centre.

Andaz 15th Avenue will welcome its first guests this summer. Located in Bryant Park, Midtown Manhattan, the hotel faces the New York Public Library. The interior spaces of the 144-room hotel will be inspired by iconic NYC features.

The ash cloud from the Eyjafjöll volcano has caused hotel room prices in major cities to soar. According to the Trivago barometer, during the flight bans in April, rates rose by 94 % in Milan, 52 % in London, 67 % in Berlin and 28 % in Amsterdam.

PEGASUS AIR launches Marseille-Istanbul service with four weekly flights by Boeing 737-800.

The European Union is due to lift restrictions on liquids carried in cabin baggage before April 2013. In the meantime, an initial relaxation will allow European travellers to bring back any liquid or gel purchased in a duty-free shop in a third country from April 2011.

LOT has optimised its schedules to Kalingrad with a daily flight and excellent connections to Paris.

AIR CARIBBEAN has revised its baggage allowance. Since 1 May, the rule has been two free hold baggage items weighing up to 23 kg each; the airline charges 20 euros for each additional kilo.

AIR ARABIA is now present on the Montpellier-Casablanca route with three weekly flights.

SWISS inaugurates its Zurich-San Francisco flight. Chicago, Los Angeles and Sao Paulo are once again served daily, as are New York-JFK twice daily. It has also increased its frequencies to Montreal, Newark and Shanghai.

OLYMPIC AIR, the successor to Olympic Airlines, has launched a Gold business class with long-haul seats on the Athens-London route.

In the midst of restructuring, Japan Air Lines is nevertheless planning to develop its international routes from Tokyo-Haneda airport, close to the capital. On 31 October, JAL will inaugurate flights to Bangkok, Honolulu, San Francisco, Paris and Taipei. At the same time, the airline is reducing or suspending frequencies on 45 routes. Between now and September, the Tokyo-Narita routes to Amsterdam, Milan, Rome, Bali, Brisbane, Sao Paolo and Hawaii will be discontinued, as will the Osaka routes to Bali, Guangzhou, Guam, Hong Kong and Beijing.

MALAYSIA AIRLINES is making it easier to change bookings on its website. Passengers can now change the date or time of their flight, subject to a surcharge for domestic flights or flights to Brunei and Singapore.

It's a summer to remember for LOT, with the opening of four new stopovers from Warsaw. Daily flights now connect the Polish capital with Tallinn, Bratislava and Göteborg. There are also three flights a week to Beirut.

Openskies, the young 100 % business airline, a subsidiary of British Airways, began its five weekly flights to Washington on 3 May, barely a year after opening services to New York-Newark.