MEXICO CITY, Oct 27 (Reuters) – Mexican airline Volaris said on Wednesday it would begin offering flights to and from the new planned airport for Mexico City when it is scheduled to open in March 2022.
Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador has championed the still unfinished Felipe Angeles International Airport, about 30 miles (48 km) north of the existing Benito Juarez airport, since cancelling in 2018 a partly-built airport for the city laid out by his predecessor.
The scrapping of the more central airport during the transition to Lopez Obrador’s accession roiled Mexico’s financial markets and set the tone for the president’s often confrontational relations with business in office.
The leftist president argued that the airport project he inherited, which was initially slated to cost $13 billion, was uneconomical and riddled with corruption.
Volaris VOLARA.MX is Mexico’s biggest airline by passenger numbers. It said in a statement it would begin the new flight routes on March 21, 2022, the day the new airport is due to open. The first two routes will be to Tijuana and Cancun.
Critics of the Felipe Angeles hub say its distance from the existing airport could lead to complications with connecting flights, and a number of engineering experts have raised concerns about conflicting flight paths between the two. The government has rejected those concerns.
(Writing by Laura Gottesdiener, Editing by Rosalba O’Brien)
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