مقاله سال ۲۰۱۶

Since the 1960s, aviation and tourism have developed a strong mutual dependency with both industries relying considerably on each other to sustain their development (Duval, 2013; Lohmann and Duval, 2014). This phenomenon is even more evident in the case of land mass countries with strong domestic markets (Koo and Lohmann, 2013), insular destinations (Liasidou, 2013), remote regions (Bråthen and Halpern, 2012) and international long hauldependent economies (Becken and Lennox, 2012). A large body of the academic literature on the aviation-tourism interconnection focuses on the enabling factors to facilitate air service development, particularly in regards to (a) multi/bi-lateral air service agreements (ASA)din broader terms, what Duval (2013) has labelled aeropoliticsd; (b) liberalization (Dobruszkes and Mondou, 2013; O’Connell and Warnock-Smith, 2012); and (c) facilitation of connectivity and availability (Duval and Schiff, 2011). However, the understanding of “why” air routes fail and are suspended is somehow less examined in the academic literature, despite the evident importance of learning from unsuccessful experiences (de Wit and Zuidberg, 2016). Additionally, most of the industry reports on the number of air route suspensions are either expensive to obtain (e.g., the Official Airline Guide, or OAG) or treat suspension on a case-by-case basis (e.g., Centre for Asia Pacific AviationdCAPA’s website), rather than providing a holistic analysis on the reasons for suspension. Nevertheless, Dobruszkes (2013) brief mentions the problem by reporting on the fact that between 1995 and 2010, up to 27% of city-pair routes previously operated by LCCs have been dropped in Europe.

Despite the importance of understanding the procedures for suspension of air transport, the academic literature provides no framework for analysing the decision-making process and the role of different factors and stakeholders in this process. Other studies examining this topic have analysed the procedures for developing air routes (Swan, 2002) or some aspect of maintaining operating air routes (Calderon, 1997
). Regional airport characteristics have also been studied (Baker and Donehue, 2012), and flight frequency has been thoroughly investigated (Hsu and Wen, 2003). Importantly, in this paper, the term “route suspension” refers to routes that airlines have no plans to reinstate. We have purposely not used the term “cancellation,” which among some aviation professionals connotes a more temporary status. We also do not include cases when the entire airline is grounded and its network is impacted on multiple fronts because we only address the individual cases of route suspension. We also did not analyse cases in which airlines completely abandon one particular base (Malighetti et al., 2015).

This paper investigates the decision-making process in domestic air route suspensions in Australia using examples and cases between 2008 and 2013. We seek to determine what aviation and non-aviation factors influence decisions on predominantly leisure travel routes. Leisure routes tend to be more susceptible to suspension due to the seasonality of the holiday market and the fact that it is easily impacted by financial crisis and less favourable economic environments. In terms of price, leisure demand is much less elastic than that of business travellers (Dresner, 2006). The paper also examines routes potentially at risk of suspension, requiring the contribution of key stakeholders to avoid suspension. This differs from previous studies on route churn, where the focus has been on understanding the reasons and patterns for route suspension, rather than proposing solutions (de Wit and Zuidberg, 2016). In this regard, Australia, with a large mature domestic travel market and tourism comprising one of its main economic powerhouses, is a suitable case study to understand domestic air route suspension. Previous studies have focused on the European international market (de Wit and Zuidberg, 2016) or in various international routes (Hsu and Wen, 2003). In 2014, among the 34 OECD countries, in addition to six major emerging economies, Australia was considered as having the most liberalised air transport environment, one where foreign airlines are allowed to operate, hence providing the opportunity to examine the existing volatility in terms of route suspension (Department of Infrastructure and Regional Development (2015)). We identify the roles that stakeholders, including airports and destination management organizations (DMOs), can play in supporting airlines in avoiding these suspensions. These roles are particularly relevant because secondand third-tier destinations struggle to compete with main urban/ wealthier destinations that are prone to invest resources to crosssubsidise marketing initiatives to support airlines in promoting their destinations. de Wit and Zuidberg (2016) report on the shift from secondary and tertiary airports to main airports, even among LCCs.