Low-cost carriers get own terminal in Malasia

"Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi yesterday launched the biggest low-cost-carrier airline terminal in the world, designed to handle up to 10 million passengers a year.

The 108-million ringgit (Bt1.1-billion) terminal, known as LCC Terminal-KLIA, is an extension of KL International airport. Abdullah was accompanied by transport minister Chan Kong Choy and other senior officials from the ministry of transport, Malaysia Airport Holdings Bhd, AirAsia Bhd and officials from the aviation industry. For the 130 passengers on board AirAsia flight AK 6315 from Penang, the first to land at the new terminal, there was the added surprise of a being greeted by Abdullah. AirAsia, Asia's largest low-fare airline, and its associates Thai AirAsia and Indonesia AirAsia, will be the main carriers at the terminal and occupy up to two-thirds of the check-in counters and 4,925 square metres of office space on its mezzanine floor.

The opening of the terminal marks a milestone for the aviation industry and Malaysia. No-frills or low-cost travel is a new phenomenon in the region.

AirAsia has pioneered and revolutionised low-cost travel in the region. With its fast-growing network, which now encompasses Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, Macau, Vietnam, Cambodia, China and the Philippines, it has carried 17 million passengers to date. The terminal will make Malaysia an important hub for low-cost travel in the region and it is expected that development of the market will further stimulate growth in the tourism industry. According to Chan, the completion of the project, which took less than nine months, is a reflection of his government's commitment to develop the low-cost travel sector.

"Although this is a low-cost-carrier terminal, the facilities offered are similar if not better than at other international airports in the region," he said. Meanwhile, Malaysia Airports' managing director, Bashir Ahmad, said it was hoped that with this terminal, low-cost carriers would make Malaysia their new destination. He added that he expected to see the low-cost sector make rapid progress.

The opening of the terminal completes KLIA as an integrated airport that caters to passengers of all levels. Last year 23.2 million passed through KLIA, of which low-cost airline passengers constituted 17 per cent (4.0 million passengers).

Suchat Sritama. The Nation, KUALA LUMPUR"

I understand that the new Budget LCC airport is 20 kl (or was that miles?) from Klia with a bus service between the two. Singapore opens it's new Budget airline terminal within days and it's part of Chiangi. What price Dom Muang leftovers?

After reading here on the board about low cost carrier Phuket Air, i will be very cautios about using these cheapie carriers from Asia. I think i will just stick to the Schedual airlines, a little more cost but a lot saffer i suspect. Its true most times what they say " You get what you pay "

It does not work that way. Have a browse through http://www.airsafe.com/index.html to see which airlines have poor safety records - actually Phuket Air did not but there were an excessive number of small faults - which according to the British Airworthy Inspectors were not in themselves dangerous but there were too many. After that and the air fuel leak everyone lined up to condemn them.

"Safety standards: A Department for Transport spokesman said a recent inspection by the Civil Aviation Authority on a Phuket Air plane found that the aircraft failed to reach safety standards. The CAA found a faulty collision avoidance system, damaged gearbox and defective emergency lights. The spokesman added: "The faults on the aircraft were only fairly minor and there was nothing to cause major alarm. "But when you added all the faults together they didn't reach the safety standards required."
BBC News

Section with remarks on American and United airlines poor safety record deleted as they (amazingly) included figures for the 9/11 terrorist attack on the USA. My thanks to Up2U for highlighting that.

The old Don-muang Airport in Bangkok will be an ideal airport for low cost airlines, given that it has already got every thing ready to run and that it is predicted that the new airport won't be able to cope with the increased number of passengers. But I doubt if the government would be interested to use the old airport for low cost airlines becasue it does not need any extra building works which usually enable corruptions in their bid and tender system.

No building works, no corruptions, no good - project dismissed !.

"...you will see that the highest risk airline to fly, US based are United and American even when comparing the number of airmiles flown to fatal accidents."....no fan of United or American but in fairness there score is skewed because of 9/11 with over 3000 plus fatalities charged against them.

Up2U - You illustrate the importance of in-depth analysis before jumping to conclusions. I am as guilty as many and did not see the 9/11 content. I am removing that section of my post.

AirAsia to Take Over Routes From Malaysia, The Associated Press

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia тАФ Budget carrier AirAsia expects to add over 100 domestic flights a day following the government's plan to give it routes from money-losing Malaysia Airlines, a top official said Friday.
AirAsia, the region's largest no-frills airline, currently operates 250 flights daily. But the recent government decision to hand over Malaysia Airlines routes to AirAsia will add at least 108 flights daily to its current schedule, AirAsia's director of corporate affairs and strategy Timothy Ross said in prepared text to an investment conference here.

AirAsia needs 10 planes to handle the additional flights, and may get six of those from Malaysia Airlines Bhd. AirAsia could also hire as many as 800 Malaysia Airlines staff, Ross said. It wasn't immediately clear how many domestic flights will continue to be operated by Malaysia Airlines, or MAS. The airline has said only four of its 118 domestic routes were profitable. Local media had reported the airline may cling onto four or five key domestic destinations, which are mainly urban centers and tourist spots. MAS is also expected to streamline its international routes because only 48 out of 114 are profitable. It has said it would gradually shift to a "hub and spoke network" to boost its competitiveness. Earlier this month, it announced that from June it would cease operations to seven international routes _ from Kuala Lumpur to Ahmedabad and Kolkata in India, Xian in China, Padang in Indonesia and Manchester and Vienna in Europe.

MAS recently reported a loss of 616.4 million ringgit ($165 million) for the October-December quarter, its third straight quarterly loss, which it blamed on higher fuel costs and higher provisions for expected future costs. Unions representing its 23,000-workforce on Thursday appealed to the government not to allow AirAsia to assume the airline's domestic responsibilities, saying as many as 7,000 jobs could be lost.

A 24 hour skybus service will connect KL's new LCCT (Low Cost Carrier Terminal) to Kuala Lumphur Sentral (sic)

http://www.skybus.com.my/

Having just established via another thread on this board that the best way of getting from KL international Airport is by train, I find that my flight is now going to a new terminal 20 KMs away from KLIA.

Honestly!