Farewell to Icelandic PLAY Airlines, 2025

 

A billboard at Keflavík Airport, advertising the route system of ultra-low-cost airline PLAY as it appeared in September 2024. Heavy on continental Europe, with significant overlap of its flag-carrier rival Icelandair to Span and Scandinavia, but with a handful of unique outstations including Athens, Bologna, Lisbon, Liverpool, Porto, and Venice. 

The service to "New York" was actually to Stewart International Airport in Newburgh some 60 miles north of what most people consider the destination "New York" to be; likewise the flight to "Toronto" was actually to John C. Monro Airport in Hamilton, Ontario—not the better known hubs served by Icelandair (both of these smaller airports making their Timetablist debut with this post). The Canadian operation ended in the Spring of 2025 as PLAY liquidated its transatlantic operations. 

Whatever the commercial attempts undertaken to differentiate itself, PLAY went the way of purple predecessor WOW Air and is no longer with us. 

Norwegian Air Shuttle: The Long-Haul Destinations, November 2016

The recent route map of Norwegian Long Haul, the dreamliner-fleet division of Norwegian Air Shuttle, rapidly covering the globe.

The emphasis on dominating the low-fare brackets of the trans-Atlantic trade are clear, with eight American cities served, only three of which are predominantly leisure destinations: Fort Lauderdale, Las Vegas, and Orlando. Although utilizing some secondary airports like Oakland and BWI, Norwegian has not shied away from primary gateways such as LAX and JFK and other major airports like Newark. As mentioned in the first post this month about Norwegian, Barcelona will soon be added, giving several of these U.S. cities flights from six European airports on Norwegian B787s.

Four Caribbean destinations are also reached, these, interestingly served from these same North American cities: Boston—Guadeloupe and Boston—Martinique began in February 2016 before any flights to Logan from Copenhagen, Oslo, or London Gatwick. The French West Indies are served from New York and Baltimore as well. San Juan and St. Croix are only served from Europe.

The network is far less developed in the easterly direction. Reminiscent of the posts from earlier this month, but one Asian destination is served: Bangkok.

BOAC: The Speedbird Routes Across the World 1950: #2

Continuign from the previous post, the Speedbird Routes of BOAC touched a surprising number of non-Anglophone cities as they extended south from London to Casablanca, Port Etienne, then Bathurst, Freetown, Takoradi, Accra, and Lagos. A planned route would continue to Kano and cross the center of Africa to Khartoum, where the eastern line extends south to Nairobi and Johannesburg.

Less impressive than its African network are its trans-Atlantic routes, as just two left the home countries from Glasgow and Shannon, met again at Gander, and extended into North America to New York and Montreal. A single route from Baltimore linked Bermuda offshore.

Allegheny Airlines: Systemwide Network, 1963

Allegheny Airlines, the pride of the Northeast, had a taught span across the spine of Appalachia. Mainline schedules between a northern terminus at Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and a southernmost end at Washington, cross-hatched with activity out of its strong bases at Pittsburgh, Harrisburg, Wilkes-Barre, Providence and Baltimore.

Many municipal airfields which have no commercial service today, including those at Wheeling, New London, Bridgeport, Reading, were linked to regional capitals in Allegheny's cats-cradle.

The most distant routes reached the Great Lakes, splitting from Jamestown on the shores of Lake Chautauqua, continuing northward to reach Buffalo and westward to Erie, where it split again to either of those great mid-American metropoli, Cleveland and Detroit. A southwestern spur from Pittsburgh plunged down the Ohio River Valley, touching Wheeling, Marietta, and terminating at Huntington-Ashland.

Allegheny would, fifteen years after the publication of this map, and in the frenzied era of deregulation, form the basis for USAir, which would in turn lead Pittsburgh and Baltimore through massive airport expansions as major mid-continent and mid-Atlantic hubs. Today, only USAirway's presence at Philadelphia and its general prominence in the metro Washington and New York markets lend any veneration to its Alleghenian origins.

USAirways: Ft. Lauderdale Hub, 2004

USAirways established a Caribbean basin hub in the middle of the last decade, but apparently it didn't last. Sort of a shame, and a bit unexpected in that USAirways, like other legacy carriers, has been looking to international traffic for revenue growth recently, evident in USAirway's services from Belize to Rio from its Charlotte hub, which much offer more traffic and profits.

The Inauguration of Ghana Airways, 1958

Ghana Airways had a long history following this cover issue, reaching as far as Baltimore-Washington with its DC-10s. Despite a heart-felt following, the airline ceased to operate some years ago. It is now followed by Ghana International Airlines, with B757 service to Düsseldorf and London-Gatwick routes. Although this envelope was addressed to the Ghana Philatelic Agency on Wall Street in New York, the inaugural flight was almost surely to Heathrow Airport.

British Airways, the North American routes, Autumn 1999

The Trans-atlantic routes are the lifeblood of BA, but its interesting to note that a handful of these cities no longer see jets from London. These include Pittsburgh, which was once a major midwestern hub and is today eerily quiet, and Detroit, from which sadly BA recently withdrew as an unprofitable destination. More interesting are the sunbelt boomtowns, such as Charlotte, which is still connected to Europe by USAirways, as well as Phoenix and San Diego, which despite their growing size seem to lack the cosmopolitan need for a connection to Heathrow.

Time Magazine: New Routes, April 2007

World aviation was burgeoning so quickly, and reflecting globalization's new realities, that Time Magazine featured a few in April 2007. Two are for Emirates: to Houston and Sao Paulo, one was Austrian's service to Erbil, one was from Greenland to Baltimore, and finally Iran Air from Tehran to Caracas.

Icelandair System, 1999

Icelandair enjoyed a golden era as Iceland's economy boomed in the last ten years and Iceland became the hippest destination for European and American weekenders. This map shows the flag-carrier on the cusp of this period, which has since ended with the complete meltdown of the global finance, which hit Iceland as hard as any place.

Note the North American destinations: Minneapolis, Orlando, Baltimore, and Halifax-- Baltimore is sadly no longer a destination, and the other two are now seasonal. Icelandair is much more widespread in Europe, ten years on, making its own way to Helsinki, for instance. It also stretches to Seattle now, filling the gap which was created when SAS made the painful decision to withdraw its long-going Copenhagen service. Two Greenlandic cities are also marked in red, although these flights are often passed between Icelandair, Greenlandair, and Air Iceland.