Recently the authorities have begun to allow more international flights to use Haneda. The idea is to promote competition between Tokyo’s two airports and boost the aviation industry.
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To ensure that long-haul airlines remain at Narita, the aviation authorities have imposed onerous restrictions. If a long-haul carrier wishes to use Haneda it can only arrive or depart between the hours of around 2300 at night and around 0600 in the morning.
That does not present too much of a problem when flying to Singapore. But if BA were to schedule a flight leaving Haneda at 2300 (a time which would enable a full day’s work for business people) it would fall foul of the Heathrow curfew. It would be a similar situation with KLM at Schiphol and while Air France might manage an early arrival into CDG it would be at a time when the rest of Paris is shut down.
The solution for an early arrival in Europe would be to depart Haneda in the middle of the night, say at 0300, but who would want to board at such an unsocial hour knowing they faced a 13 hour flight ? We await developments as it could be that Haneda’s tough restrictions are eased in the future.
