Japan’s JAL and ANA to launch more flights from ‘convenient’ Haneda airport than Narita

Haneda is by far the favourite point of arrival or departure for visitors to Tokyo, thanks primarily to its proximity to the city centre. A train or monorail will complete the 18km journey into the heart of Tokyo in less than 20 minutes, while it takes up to 45 minutes to reach the city from Narita by rail.

That popularity means that JAL and ANA have been taking up as many landing and departure slots as possible for their passenger aircraft at Haneda also transferring cargo operations and flights with their low-cost carriers to Narita.

From March 31, JAL will have 131 weekly international flights out of Narita on 20 routes, down sharply from 280 flights on 31 routes in the summer of 2019, the last year that air travel was not affected by the global coronavirus pandemic.

Similarly, ANA has scheduled 116 international weekly flights on 18 routes out of Narita from this summer, down from 294 flights on 34 routes before the Covid-19 crisis.

Following the flight reallocation at Narita, JAL will have 236 weekly flights on 24 routes out of Haneda this summer, up from 154 flights on 15 routes five years ago, while ANA will have 285 flights on 30 routes, an increase from the 247 flights on 24 routes it operated in 2019.

“This is not something that has just started as we do see Haneda as being more convenient for our customers,” said Saiko Kuwasaki, an official of JAL.

“Narita has more flights to and from North America that are connecting with onward flights to other parts of Asia, so we are trying to obtain more flights out of Haneda,” she told This Week in Asia.

The problem, she agreed, was that despite the rapid expansion of Haneda in recent years, there were still a finite number of aircraft slots and competition from all airlines