International travel boost brings new routes, more capacity to Australia but no airfare relief

A massive injection of international airline seats is days away — but will it be enough to bring down airfares? See who’s flying where.

Australia’s major international airports are about to get much busier as airlines dramatically increase flight frequencies and add new routes in coming days and weeks.

For the first time since the pandemic Perth residents will be able to fly non-stop to Tokyo from Sunday; Sydneysiders can head straight to Houston; Shanghai and Guangzhou will be within a single flight from Brisbane next month, and Adelaide will get a direct connection to Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam.

At the same time thousands more seats will open up on routes to the US, China, Hong Kong, Seoul and Japan to mark the start of the northern winter.

Australian Travel Industry Association chief executive Dean Long welcomed the boost to supply but warned it was unlikely to make much of a dent in international airfares.

He said fares were sitting about 15 per cent below last year’s record peaks, with no further discounting cycle expected.

“We are now seeing signs of demand cooling which could have an impact on price,” Mr Long said.

“High interest rates and those cost of living pressures have definitely reduced that superheated demand that occurred after Covid, but there’s still a really good sized market for overseas travel.”

Qantas is leading the capacity dump, with 100,000 more seats on international routes in November than October and a range of new or returning routes including Brisbane-Honiara and Sydney-Shanghai.

Qantas International CEO Cam Wallace said the additional flying was great news for customers and tourism, and meant more opportunity for the airline’s crew.

“Airlines globally have been working to restore capacity to support strong demand for international travel,” Mr Wallace said.

“With more aircraft back in the air, there are more seats to the places our customers want to travel, and just in time for the upcoming holiday peak.”

Qantas is about to restart Sydney-Shanghai flights for the first time since the pandemic struck. Picture: Luke MacGregor/Bloomberg

As one of the biggest beneficiaries of the international capacity surge, Brisbane Airport was preparing for an influx of passengers from Sunday onwards.

Over the next year, 1.3 million more seats would be available for international travellers out of Brisbane to 29 destinations.

Executive general manager of aviation Ryan Both said increasing access to overseas markets was essential for the tourism economy.

“We know when Brisbane Airport is busy, Queensland is busy, and things are about to step up a notch,” Mr Both said.

He said the restart of China Eastern and China Southern flights to Brisbane was particularly helpful, marking the return of Queensland’s most lucrative tourism market.

“We also celebrate United Airlines significantly boosting flights to Brisbane,” said Mr Both.

“It was exactly 12 months ago that United launched three flights a week from San Francisco to Brisbane. Now this will become a daily service, and United will also add Los Angeles as a destination in time for Christmas.”

Melbourne Airport was not seeing any new routes, but airlines such as United were increasing capacity by as much as 65 per cent into Tullamarine, compared to 2019.

Chief of aviation Jim Parashos said they had worked hard with their airline partners to prepare for the busiest time of the year, as Melbourne’s events season heated up.

But he said there was always room for more flights and carriers, and was hopeful the government would see fit to grant requests from Turkish Airlines and Qatar Airways.

“A daily international flight adds $150 million annually to the state’s economy and we know there are other airlines very keen to add extra capacity to Melbourne as soon as the federal government works through the bilateral air services agreement process,” Mr Parashos said.

Tourism Australia forecasts showed international airline capacity at 88 per cent of pre-Covid levels in October, rising to 93 per cent in December, and 99 per cent by the end of February.

Qantas was expected to return to 2019 levels of international capacity by mid-2024.