Philippine Airlines said Thursday it is mulling over plans to operate between Manila and Clark in a bid to develop the international airport in the former US military airbase.
“One way of developing the market is for us to operate between Manila and Clark. We filed for a slot from Manila to Clark but we were denied,” PAL president and chief operating officer Jaime Bautista told reporters.
Bautista said Airport Coordination Australia, the slot coordinator at Ninoy Aquino International Airport rejected PAL’s request for Manila to Clark flights because there were no unavailable slots.
The airport is limited to only 40 movements per hour.
“But we will try to see if there are still available slots even at night. It’s better if we have two flights per day—one in the morning and one in the afternoon. We really want to develop Clark as a premier airpot,” Bautista said.
“If you really want to develop the Clark market, we can make Manila as a hub and then passengers from many destinations all over the country can fly to our flight to Manila then we can fly them to Clark,” he said.
Bautista said the flight from Manila to Clark will be around 20 minutes and PAL could offer attractive fares.
“It’s not too far. It’s a very short flight. But I’m sure that there are passengers who are willing to take a shorter travel time and pay a little bit more but experience the comfort of flying rather than go to Clark for four hours,” he said.
Bautista also said PAL planned to start flying from Clark International Airport before the end of the year to comply with the request of the government to decongest Naia.
“We plan to fly Clark to Davao and Clark to Cebu, [and] most likely [other] major cities. Our plan is to fly passengers who will go to the north,” he said.