While Air France was already the airline is the most virtuous in mainland France since it offset all of its greenhouse gas emissions, the State asked it to go further by halving these emissions to the horizon 2024. For this, the company has an asset, the huge order it has placed for the new Airbus A220s which will replace the old A318s and A319s.
Designed and developed by Bombardier in Quebec, the A220 has the advantage of consuming 25% less kerosene, while offering remarkable comfort for passengers.
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Similarly, the progressive use of biofuels - an area in which France is far behind - will also weigh in the balance, although their production can only take off with real political will, independent of that of the airlines. In short, this will not be enough to achieve the requested objective.
Reduction of domestic flights
Finally, we come to the reduction of the operating perimeter on the metropolitan landscape. And that's the rub. The drastic reduction in domestic flights on routes where the train offers an alternative of less than 2.5 hours, as required by the State, is not necessarily good news. Neither for the passengers nor for the ecology.
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First of all because this will inevitably result in an increase in TGV prices. The users of lines like Paris-Lyon or Strasbourg-Paris, without competition with the airline, know something about it. The price surge is sensitive to this, while in Paris-Marseille or Paris-Montpellier, where competition with the air is real, the SNCF is obliged to contain its prices. Let us judge: compared to the kilometer, the price of a Paris-Marseille is much cheaper than a Paris-Lyon!
The TGV ever more expensive?
The main line affected by this new measure is the Bordeaux-Orly line. Its removal, even partial, would be a nice gift for SNCF, which is overcapacity on this line. In fact, the SNCF had initially planned 18 daily round trips with or without stops, before the State forced it to operate 32, to finance the private operator who built the high-speed line.
Beneficiary with 18 trips, it has a deficit with 32. Because we do not know enough, but for each train the SNCF must pay a network usage fee which corresponds to approximately 30% of the price of each ticket. Suffice to say that the few hundred thousand passengers won over Air France customers would be welcome. In a monopoly situation, the SNCF could thus increase its prices.
Should we remember that the TGV in France is not a public service? On these high-speed lines, the SNCF actually behaves like a private operator seeking to obtain the best possible unit revenue. Let us remember the redesign of the young, senior, child and frequency reduction cards, pompously transformed into an "Advantage" or "Freedom" card, which resulted in a sharp increase in prices and new obligations for set of passengers.
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The correspondence puzzle
According to this 2:30 hour rule, only air connections would be allowed to reach the Roissy hub for connecting passengers. Some professional letters even claim that passengers who simply want to travel from Bordeaux to Paris without a connection could no longer board these flights.
If necessary, we would come to an economic and ecological heresy. Quite simply from the fact that on transfer flights to Roissy, approximately 50% of passengers are connecting. Cutting the remaining 50% would force the company to use smaller planes, therefore more polluting and at higher cost at headquarters.
A rule that must be the same for everyone
To achieve a 50% drop in its greenhouse gas emissions, the government also wants to encourage the company to reduce its cross-connections. If they participate in regional planning, the latter are often not very profitable.
However, this principle only makes sense if it is applied to all companies. Imagine that Air France stops its Lyon-Lille line. As we are in an open sky system where each company has the right to operate from one point to another the link it wishes, a competitor would immediately take over to ensure this relationship. A company less virtuous from an ecological point of view like Volotea which uses McDonnel Douglas 95 renamed Boeing 717, old very polluting planes.
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Or even EasyJet which has newer planes. However, neither of them is committed to offsetting 100% of its greenhouse gas emissions, as Air France does. If the will of the government is commendable, these ecological obligations must apply to all airlines to be effective.
The return of “Air Inter”
What if Air France, thanks to Transavia, revived Air Inter? This former airline based in Orly held a virtual monopoly on domestic flights and charged very low prices using large planes, Airbus A300 and A330, whose capacity almost equaled that of a TGV. In this hypercompetitive universe, Air France has a good role to play with Transavia. This low cost subsidiary already has, in addition to Orly, three bases in the provinces with Lyon, Montpellier and Nantes, which would allow it to ensure cross-connections.
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But to date, metropolitan connections are not authorized due to an agreement with Air France pilots. In favor of the current crisis, would it be possible to transfer certain routes operated by Air France or Hop to Transavia? The company says it will give an answer next summer. It is even said that Transavia could provide a certain number of routes from Orly. A relevant perspective because the operating costs of Transavia are lower than those of easyJet.
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On the condition, however, of maintaining commercial homogeneity for the entire territory. With a very varied range of subscription cards (weekend cards, seniors, young people, etc.) and its Flying blue loyalty system, Air France has a colossal strike force from a commercial point of view.
As long as the rules remain the same and the passenger can keep his advantages such as the sky priority, it does not matter to him whether the flight is operated by Air France, Hop or Transavia. It would suffice for this that the tickets are all sold on the Air France website with Air France flight numbers. If that were the case, then easyJet and Volotea would have a lot to worry about.