TAP resumes international flights in Porto and restarts Porto-Brussels service
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Porto-Brussels link resumes July 2019 with two daily flights. TAP will also expand more flights to New York and plans new routes to other European destinations. Departure delays from the air shuttle service, designated "Ponte Aérea", to connect Lisbon and Porto's airports with flights every hour will increase punctuality.
TAP strategy regarding the city of Porto appears to be shifting, after the airliner had removed routes in 2015. The company is majority State owned and following the previous decision of services reduction from Porto Airport, the new administration intends to reverse this strategy and has announced new routes, starting next year.
As of July 2019, Porto Airport will have two direct links to Brussels. September that year, TAP Porto codeshare expands to Lyon, with two daily flights. That very month, TAP starts Porto-Munich link, one frequency per day.
Besides the new routes, it should be highlighted the increase of weekly flight frequencies to New York and Madrid. TAP triples the number of flights to the Big Apple, moving forward to six weekly flights.
The Portuguese flagship airliner adds nine more frequencies to Madrid, rising from 12 to 19 flights between Porto and the Spanish Capital.
Also, in October, TAP announces changes in the "Ponte aérea", the air shuttle service that operates Porto- Lisboa round trip flights will be optimised as punctuality will be a major concern, something that is feasible because another aircraft is joining the fleet. As a result, the first flight departs Lisbon at 6 am, an hour earlier than at present time, totalling 18 round trip daily flights.
According to the Portuguese airliner, "this is the biggest flight offer ever in Porto", with 322 flights per week, more than 88 weekly services than in 2015.
It should be recalled that Rui Moreira, the Mayor of Porto was one of the most critical voices when TAP announced service reduction in Porto. Later, Rui Moreira and Nuno Nogueira Santos wrote and published the book "TAP Caixa Negra" ["TAP Black Box", free translation].