NEW YORK and TORONTO — TAP Portugal is adding six new destinations to its global route network by July 2017, including Toronto, the airline’s fifth North American gateway, it was announced Dec. 6.
TAP will also add five new European destinations: Budapest; Bucharest, Romania; Las Palmas and Alicante, Spain; and Stuttgart, Germany. With these five new cities, TAP will serve 52 European destinations, adding more options to its Stopover program where travelers can enjoy a one-, two- or three-day visit to Portugal on the way for no extra airfare.
The airline will also add additional flight frequencies in Europe to Madrid (departing Porto), Manchester, U.K., Moscow, Dusseldorf, Germany and Faro, Portugal.
The growth planned for 2017 is in line with the expansion strategy TAP began in 2016, including the order of a new medium and long haul Airbus fleet (due for delivery by end of 2017); two additional A330 aircraft; the cabin retrofit of 48 aircraft currently underway; the launch of the new brand TAP Express for regional operations; the new Lisbon/Oporto shuttle service; the launch of TAP Stopover and the addition of two routes to North America, with the relaunch of service from Boston and New York’s JFK.
Following the successful launch of the Lisbon/Porto shuttle and the frequency increases to both Madeira and the Azores, TAP will, as of next summer, increase operations from Lisbon to Faro, growing from three to four dailies.
To support the additional operations, the company will add another long-haul aircraft (A330), two medium-haul aircraft (A320F) and four Embraers to join TAP Express regional operations, increasing TAP’s fleet from 80 to 87 aircraft in total.
TAP’s four US gateways are New York’s JFK; Newark, NJ; Boston, Mass. and Miami, Fla.
This month, Global Traveler magazine named TAP as Best Airline in Europe for the sixth consecutive year as well as delivering the Best New Route Launch (Boston-Lisbon).
Leave a Reply