German airlines pitch plan to return trans-Atlantic flights

Germany’s main aviation industry group has proposed the creation of limited air-travel corridors between major U. and European hubs, a bid to crack open the nearly dormant market for trans-Atlantic flight. The pilot projects would link US airports in Chicago, Boston, Los Angeles and New York City-adjacent Newark, NJ, with Frankfurt and Munich in Germany, along with other major European intercontinental hubs, executives at BDL, which represents Germany’s airports and airlines, said in an online press event Wednesday. The proposal, which would require passengers to produce a negative test for Covid-19 before flying, is an effort to revive a market that’s the industry’s biggest profit producer and help major European airline groups recover from the pandemic. London-New York was the world’s top revenue-generating route with more than $1b in annual sales before governments imposed lengthy travel bans to contain the coronavirus earlier this year. Covid-19 testing exists at the German airports and could quickly be installed elsewhere, according to the BDL executives, Matthias von Randow and Peter Gerber. Lufthansa, IAG and Air France-KLM all have commercial partnerships with one of the large U.S. network airlines. However, the plan will need to involve the foreign, transport and health ministries in Germany alone, while a multitude of international authorities have to agree on which kind of test would be accepted, BDL said.<br/>