Airlines expand, railways slow down While domestic passenger transport witnessed a high growth rate in the first six months of the year, the railways had unsatisfactory business results. This shows that air services have attracted passengers who travel on trains and cars.   Airlines served 25 million in the first six months, an increase of 29.7 percent compared with the same period of last year. The domestic transport alone witnessed impressively high growth rate of 33 percent. This is explained by the fact that Vietnam’s air carriers opened a series of new domestic air routes, especially Vietjet Air and Jetstar Pacific. Vietjet Air, for example, has opened new routes from Hai Phong City in the north to Phu Quoc, Da Lat and Buon Ma Thuot in the south and central region; and from Thanh Hoa to Nha Trang. Meanwhile, Jetstar Pacific has launched new flights from Hue to Nha Trang, from Hanoi to Chu Lai and from Hanoi to Quy Nhon. While domestic passenger transport witnessed a high growth rate in the first six months of the year, the railways had unsatisfactory business results. Besides, they have also decided to provide more flights in summer, especially in the high season of June. Vietjet Air reported the increase of 5,700 flights and 1 million air tickets. Vietnam Airlines, the nation’s flag air carrier, provided 2,115 more flights and offered 662,000 more seats, raising total transport output on its domestic routes to 3.5 million seats, an increase of 22.9 percent in comparison with the same period last year. A pricing expert commented that Vietnamese tend to choose air transport instead of roads because the aviation market has become more competitive. Since airlines have to compete fiercely with each other to attract passengers, they have to lower airfares. This partially explains why the number of railway passengers decreased in the first half of the year, which led to a decrease in turnover to VND1.954 trillion, or equal to 77.5 percent of the same period last year. According to the Vietnam Railway (VNR), the Ghenh Bridge collapse which occurred days before the April holiday, the interruption of the north-south traffic was a major reason behind the decline. A report showed that the accident caused a loss of VND535 billion. VNR also attributes this to the mass fish deaths in the central provinces, which led to a sharp fall in the number of travelers to the areas. The number of passengers booking tickets for trains from HCMC to Da Nang, Hue and Dong Hoi in summer decreased considerably compared to last summer. Phung Thi Ly Ha, deputy CEO of the Hanoi Railway, admitted that railways now must compete fiercely with budget airlines to attract passengers.  TBKTSG