Last week, United Airlines restored its nonstop service from Los Angeles to Shanghai.
United scrapped their LAX-Shanghai route back in 2020. The airline first announced they would resume the service in March; finally, they have made good on that promise.
It now becomes the only US carrier to offer the direct route, after Delta Air Lines pulled its LAX to Shanghai service in May.
Currently, United Airlines and China Eastern are the only carriers with nonstop flights to Shanghai.
United already has flights to Beijing and Shanghai out of San Francisco International Airport (SFO), but the restored route from LAX will hopefully help to alleviate flight costs from the United States to China.
Image via Ai
The move comes as many other Western carriers have been scaling back their flights to China due to capacity restrictions (the Chinese government has imposed strict limits on access to its market since the pandemic) and the ongoing lack of demand.
Many European airlines have also cited the closure of Russian airspace – which caused flight times and costs to increase – as the reason for halting their China services.
In July, Virgin Atlantic pulled its London to Shanghai service due to these “significant complexities and challenges.”
READ MORE: Virgin Atlantic to Cancel Only China Flight
British Airways will also halt its flights to Beijing from October 25 “until at least November 2025.”
READ MORE: British Airways to Halt Beijing-London Route
Prior to the pandemic, airlines were permitted to operate up to 150 flights per a day between the US and China. However, both countries imposed limits on the number of daily flights as geopolitical tensions began to rise at the start of COVID.
China has been slow to scale back these restrictions, and US carriers haven’t been able to compete with the availability and pricing of Chinese airlines on routes to China – a situation exacerbated by the fact Chinese carriers still have access to Russian airspace.
This has resulted in US airlines lobbying the federal government to refrain from lifting flight restrictions on Chinese airlines until the Chinese government does the same for them.
Their representatives say the restrictions on US airlines reflect “anti-competitive policies of the Chinese government.”
Here’s to hoping this new route is a sign of tensions easing and travel prices decreasing!
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[Cover image via United Airlines]
