PPRuNe Forums - Open Skies on the horizon

Today and tomorrow, EU transport ministers meeting in Brussels will decide to hand over the right to negotiate a Europe wide bilateral with the US, to the EU Commission.

The two last obstacles to this were the UK (due to concerns over Heathrow, which will remain a difficult negotiating obstacle) and Ireland (which has had political concerns, due to the Shannon stopover issue).

It is expected that the EU will commence negotiations with the US within the next few weeks and with any luck, Ireland's 50/50 rule with the Shannon stopover will be axed soon after, allowing Aer Lingus to add two new US routes (as it has suggested, itself) by the end of the year.

Although the Open Skies agreements concluded between several EU nations and the US were (with the exception of the Netherlands) declared illegal, open skies will effectively continue with these countries, subject to the proviso that any EU carrier will be able to operate to the US from any other country; so Lufthansa could effectively operate from CDG or Dublin. The ownership rules will also be dropped, which may well open the door to takeovers.

From an Irish perspective, this is a hugely important development and as someone who's been active in arguing against the stopover since the early '90s, permit me a quiet, discreet "yippeee"!