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everal airlines have expressed their reluctance over a proposal made by state airport operator Angkasa Pura (AP) II to reduce the flights at Soekarno-Hatta International Airport during peak hours in its bid to improve services to customers.

Low cost carrier Citilink commercial director Hans Nugroho said that he hoped that the operator would reconsider the plan because the change would hurt the country'€™s airline industry. '€œWe hope that they won'€™t reduce the flight quota because it means that we would be forced to provide fewer flights,'€ he said recently.

Hans said that Citilink would talk with the Indonesian National Air Carriers Association (INACA) regarding the plan.

Expressing the same concerns, Garuda Indonesia president director Arif Wibowo said that the airport operator should instead increase the capacity of the existing airport. '€œThe airport is still capable of receiving 86 million passengers a year, if it is further expanded,'€ he said.

At present Soekarno-Hatta International Airport, one of the major airports operated under AP II, is capable of receiving 22 million passengers per year, AP II operations and engineering director Djoko Murjatmodjo said. The company plans to gradually increase its capacity, eventually hoping to sustain more than 60 million passengers in the next two years.

Previously, AP II president director Budi Karya Sumadi stated that his firm had proposed, to the Transportation Ministry'€™s directorate general for air transportation, to shift some peak hour flights, particularly those between approximately 6 a.m. to 8 a.m. in the morning and 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. at night, to less hectic time schedules earlier in the morning, later in the afternoon and in the evening.

There has been a tendency for dozens of flights to pile up on the same time schedule, both morning and afternoon, Budi explained, adding that it was impossible to allow more than 72 flights to take-off in the space of an hour. He said he aimed to reduce flights to between 60 or 70 per hour.

'€œIt would take a longer time to take off and to land,'€ Budi explained, while stating that he hoped to see the new arrangement begin within the next two weeks.

He also said that the proposed plan would not decrease the number of flights, simply evenly distribute them. Currently, Soekarno-Hatta International Airport sees at least 1,000 to 1,100 flights daily, according to Budi.

His company plans to begin talking to airlines, appealing to them to deploy wide-body airplanes during peak hours so as to transport more passengers per plane, with the potential for merging at least two of their flights.

AP II and the ministry have said they would also arrange for an equal and proportional mechanism and provide incentives to the affected airlines.

Low cost carrier Lion Air airport operation and services director Daniel Putut said that he would first discuss the matter with the AP II, while declining to mention the impact of the policy to the airline.

Meanwhile, low-cost carrier Indonesia Air Asia corporate secretary Audrey Progastama Petriny said that the airline remained in the dark about the details of the plan. (fsu)