Cayman looks at airport extension as new routes boost recovery

With the introduction of new routes, Cayman’s airlift capacity in the last quarter of this year is predicted to surpass 2019 levels by 1%, highlighting a need to potentially further expand the Owen Roberts International Airport, Tourism Minister Kenneth Bryan says.

Though it’s just a single-percent increase in available airline seats, it is being hailed as a major sign of recovery within the tourism sector and an indication of international airlines’ confidence in Cayman as a holiday destination, Bryan told reporters at a Caribbean Tourism Organization press briefing this week.

The minister noted that the anticipated increase has been led by additional American Airlines connections through Charlotte and Miami; Southwest’s strong feeder markets in Texas; United’s growth in Washington D.C. and Newark; a new non-stop route from the Baltimore-Washington gateway; as well as a direct flight to Los Angeles by Cayman Airways, which will launch in November.

“This encouraging news is a sign of confidence in our destination by international airlines, especially at a time when some destinations are experiencing reduced frequency,” Bryan said.

Air arrivals have been steadily climbing as Cayman dropped its COVID-19 travel restrictions in increments from late last year. The last remaining restrictions – on unvaccinated travellers – were lifted last month.

Between January and June this year, more than 114,000 stayover visitors arrived on island, equivalent to 41% of the air arrivals recorded over the first six months in 2019 – the last full year of travel before the pandemic began in March 2020.

Where passengers are coming from

Bryan noted that the vast majority of travellers – 80% – come from the United States, with 11% of those coming from New York, 10.9% from Texas, and 9.7% from Florida.

The two next largest markets are Canada, at 7%, and the United Kingdom, at 5%.

Asked if there were efforts under way to attract more visitors from Britain, Bryan said the UK was very important to Cayman, as it acts as a feeder market for European travellers, and “we want to grow that”.

British Airways is currently the only airline with a route from London to Grand Cayman. That route includes a one-hour stopover in Nassau, Bahamas.

Bryan said Virgin Atlantic had expressed interest in operating a route from the UK to Cayman, but difficulties had arisen over the length of the Owen Roberts runway and the types of planes the airline was running.

Streamlining customs clearances to tackle bottlenecks

But with increased airlift and passenger numbers comes the possibility of the types of bottlenecks Owen Roberts International Airport was experiencing both before and after its multi-million dollar expansion which was completed in 2019, which doubled the terminal’s capacity.

Overcrowding at the airport occurs when airlines request similar time slots – often to meet schedules for connecting flights at hub airports in the US. It’s an issue, Bryan said, that “we recognise and we’re intending to resolve”.

“How best to do that is work with the airlines for better scheduling, to spread the arrivals along the 18 hours that we’re open. The bottleneck is that every airline wants to come in at exactly the same time,” he said.

Another approach being considered to avoid slow processing times when the airport is extremely busy is to fast track incoming passengers through customs, Bryan said, adding that the money being collected on import duties “is so miniscule compared to the value of the service, of enjoying the transition off the plane, into a taxi and into a hotel that we’re almost subsidising it”.

He said his ministry was working with Deputy Premier Chris Saunders, whose portfolio includes Customs and Border Control, on this plan.

“We’re working on little things to speed it up, but ideally what’s most important is that we have to expand the airport again,” he said.

Director of Tourism Rosa Harris, who also spoke at the tourism industry briefing on Monday, said the Cayman Islands Airports Authority has a team and a scheduling system for all airlines to bid on landing time slots, which was used when there were tight restrictions on incoming aircraft during the pandemic. This, she said, is still in place “because, of course, the capacity management is continuing in our COVID controls, in terms of how do we manage people through the facility”.

Bryan also noted that the airport had purchased a slot management system that is managed outside of Cayman.

Harris told reporters, “The facility does need to get bigger, or we get another airport.”

Airport expansion review

A review on the expansion of the airport is likely to be completed within eight months, Bryan said, adding, “That will tell us where we need to be because we’re moving faster than we ever thought, but that’s a good problem to have.”

An airport expansion plan, drawn up in 2014, recommended a new commercial terminal with larger capacity, and this was the expansion completed in 2019. Prince Charles officially opened the new, larger terminal during his visit to Cayman in March that year.

A strategic outline case, issued by the Airports Development Project Steering Committee and CIAA Board of Directors in November last year, noted that, according to the 2014 plan, the passenger numbers realised in 2019 – a record year for arrivals – would trigger a new plan for additional airport expansion.