TAIPEI: Two new air routes between Taiwan and the mainland are being hailed as a breakthrough in cross-Straits travel.

The "second northern route" and the "south route" will save time for travelers and cut fuel costs for airlines.

Su Langen, director of the Air Traffic Management Bureau of Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC), announced the opening of the new routes in Guangzhou yesterday.

The new routes will provide a safer, more convenient and more flexible environment for regular flights across the Taiwan Straits in future, Su said.

Shen Chi, director of the Air Navigation and Weather Services of Taiwan's Civil Air Administration, hailed the opening of new routes as a "breakthrough".

The Taipei Area Control Center has started direct communication to its counterpart in Guangzhou for the first time and more co-ordination efforts will be necessary, Shen added.

A jet owned by Taiwan's TransAsia Airways took off at 10:42 am from Shanghai Pudong International Airport and headed toward Taipei Songshan Airport, the first to fly along the second northern route.

And a China Southern Airlines aircraft bound for Taoyuan International Airport departed from Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport at 11:35 am, the first to use the southern route.

The second northern route will relieve pressure of the first northern route. Flight time between Taiwan and northeastern mainland cities including Dalian, Qingdao, Shenyang and Harbin will be cut by some 24 minutes for a Boeing 737 or an Airbus 320. Fuel savings per flight will amount to about 1.6 tons of fuel.

Flights to and from Shanghai, Nanjing, Beijing and Hangzhou will continue to use the existing northern route.

The southern route will shorten the travel time by five minutes for flights between Taiwan and southern cities including Guangzhou, Xiamen and Kunming. More importantly, the flights are not required to cross Hong Kong air space, saving airlines a NT$5,000 service fee.

According to the April accord, passenger flights across the Taiwan Straits will increase from 108 chartered flights weekly to 270 weekly, including the scheduled and chartered.

The new routes are part of the air transport accord inked by Taiwan's Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF) and the mainland's Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits on April 26.

The first northern route was opened on December 15 last year in a landmark cross-Straits agreement that realized three direct links - direct air, sea and postal links - across the Straits. The northern route has been flown by more than 5,800 flights since.

China Daily/CNA

(HK Edition 07/30/2009 page2)