New summer air links to the UK

BUDGET airlines are preparing to boost their services from France to the UK and Ireland this summer with new routes for the peak season.

Ryanair started the expansion at the end of March with a new regular link from Bordeaux to Edinburgh, Carcassonne to Prestwick and four new routes to Leeds-Bradford: from Nantes, Carcassonne, Limoges and Montpellier.

From May 4, it launches a new route from Paris Beauvais airport to Edinburgh. The Irish budget carrier is also planning Bordeaux and La Rochelle to Cork services from June 1.

Flybe has announced about a dozen extra routes, most of which begin in the week around July 12 and run until the end of August.

The new links include Avignon to Manchester (twice-weekly) and Birmingham (three times a week). Limoges gets nine new weekly flights: three each to Manchester, Gatwick and Birmingham.

There is a new Bergerac to Manchester route flying three times a week, three weekly flights from Rennes to Birmingham and four from Bordeaux to Birmingham.

The low-cost operator is also picking up the Perpignan to Birmingham route from July 13, with flights every Tuesday, Friday and Sunday.

Bergerac to Edinburgh starts again on May 22, Avignon to Exeter on May 22 and La Rochelle-Glasgow on June 12.

Jet2 will be running a new Bergerac to Leeds-Bradford service on Saturdays throughout the summer, from May 17, with an additional Tuesday flight from late June to mid-September.

BMI Baby’s new offering for summer 2010 is a twice-weekly flight (on Mondays and Fridays) from Manchester to Lourdes, running from April 30 to October 1.

Aer Lingus has four new routes into Dublin for the summer. Bordeaux and Toulouse started at the end of March, with four weekly services. Rennes and Marseille flights to the Irish capital launch on May 1, with two weekly flights each way.

Since the end of March there has also been a new three-times-a-week link from Nice to Cork.

Easyjet has not announced any new cross-Channel routes for the summer. It is however launching Paris Charles de Gaulle to Malaga in May, Palma (Majorca) and Split (Croatia) in July.

Orly gets new routes to Venice from this month and Olbia and Palmero (Italy) and Mykonos (Greece) in July.

Three additional routes launched last month: Nice-Rome, Charles de Gaulle to Toulouse and Prague.