Europe

Riga ended 2023 with the inauguration of a new rail link to Vilnius. The capital of Latvia is entering 2024 with even greater ambitions, this time in the air sector. As a symbol of this metamorphosis, the airport is adopting a new visual identity, behind the name RIX Riga Airport. But the transformation of the...

The Scandinavian Airlines (SAS) 2024 summer network will include nine new European routes. While some of these routes will be to Mediterranean destinations - and therefore of little interest to the French market - the increase in the number of routes to Northern Europe offers good alternatives for flying to the Baltic States, Scandinavia...

Eurocontrol has just published its 2023 European Aviation Review. The organisation reports that the number of European flights has continued to recover since the end of the COVID-19 epidemic. Summer flight volumes have been particularly strong and have contributed to this recovery. Compared with pre-Covid levels, European flights in...

The change of partners for SAS Scandinavian Airlines is beginning to be reflected in the Scandinavian airline's destinations. Particularly on the North Atlantic. SAS will begin services to Atlanta, its ninth destination in North America. On 17 June, SAS will begin offering its customers a daily non-stop service to...

GERMANY Düsseldorf TRIBE Düsseldorf (end 2024) Tribe, one of the Accor group's new contemporary brands, will continue its expansion in Europe with an opening later this year in Düsseldorf, in the central Friedrichstadt district. The result of the renovation of an existing establishment, the Tribe Düsseldorf hotel will offer 146 functional, designer rooms, as well as a friendly lobby where guests can relax and...

Since 27 December, a train service operated by LTG Link, the passenger branch of Lietuvos Geležinkeliai (Lithuanian Railways, LTG), has offered a round trip between Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania, and Riga, the capital of Latvia. The two cities are 300 km apart. A standard train ticket between...

On 31 March, Bulgaria and Romania will finally join the Schengen area, after years of negotiations. For travellers, this decision will mean the abolition of border controls, which are still in place for the time being. However, the inclusion of the two Balkan states in the Schengen area is not complete. Austria and the...

As it does every year, the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) publishes its annual report on the cost of living in the world's major metropolises, resulting in a ranking of the world's most expensive cities. The survey was carried out in 173 cities between 14 August and 11 September 2023, based on the calculation of more than...

8 kg for cabin baggage, 23 kg for hold baggage. The drastic baggage restrictions for Finnair business class passengers will have lasted just over six months. The airline has just announced that it has changed the rules again, with immediate effect. The decision by...

On 11 December, Iberia launched its first direct flights to Hamad International Airport in Doha, Qatar. The flights are operated by Airbus A330-200, with a capacity of 288 passengers in Business and Eco class. With this Iberia flight, IAG is considerably strengthening its cooperation with Qatar Airways. With Madrid, London and...

France is well and truly back on the road to business travel. The latest GBTA study bears this out: according to the GBTA Business Travel Index Outlook report, by the end of the year the French market should have recovered 96% of business travel expenditure compared with 2019, the reference year. The...

From 2 June 2024, Norwegian will offer scheduled flights between Basel-Mulhouse Airport and Oslo, as well as to Copenhagen. Initially, both routes will be served twice a week. Oslo will be served twice, every Thursday and Sunday. Frequencies to Copenhagen will be every Monday and Sunday.

It's the eternal controversy over the rise in air fares and those responsible for it. For IATA, the international air transport association, the picture is somewhat Manichean. The good guys are the airlines, which are limiting their fare increases to well below inflation. The bad guys are the airports, which are indulging in shameless fee increases. IATA:...

No more excuses for not replying to an employee's WhatsApp message on a flight from Munich to London... From next January, Lufthansa will be offering its passengers a free messaging service on its European network. This offer also includes sending photos. "Lufthansa will offer unlimited free messaging on its flights...

At the end of October, Eurowings, Lufthansa's simplified services subsidiary, introduced a new service for customers with a myEurowings account. Called "Flex Light", it offers a one-off, no-fee change of flight reservation up to 40 minutes before departure. Since 26 October 2023, this option has been automatically integrated into the...

Finnair has been one of the airlines most affected by the ban on EU carriers flying over Russian territory since the outbreak of Russia's war with Ukraine. With the ban on flights over Russia, Finnair can now only reach Asia via the southern routes. In other words...

In mid-July, Renfe began services on the Lyon-Barcelona and Marseille-Barcelona-Madrid routes. One year after the arrival of Trenitalia and its Frecciarossa operating on the Paris-Lyon-Milan route, the launch of the Spanish national carrier on French rail represents a new stage in the opening up to rail competition, which will be possible from December 2020. Following the applications...

Choice Hotels made no secret of its desire to acquire the Wyndham group. A merger between the world's two largest franchisors could create a group almost the size of Marriott, the world's largest hotel group with over 1.5 million rooms. For the last six months,...

New York's ban on renting out entire homes on a short-term basis is certainly a wake-up call for private rental platforms. Indeed, many critics of this participatory economy model accuse platforms like Airbnb of drying up the rental market. In the United States, there is a lot of talk about...

Finnair has already announced its plans for the 2024 summer season by revealing some of the new features already scheduled in its flight programme. These include more frequencies from France. But also between Finland and Germany, Scandinavia and Poland. In France, the carrier will be...