Word: skytrains
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Launched in 1966 as a charter carrier, Laker Airways jolted competitors in 1977 with its Skytrain round-trip service between New York and London for $236, or almost $200 less than the best excursion fare available on regularly scheduled airlines. Beamed Laker: "This puts transatlantic air travel in the pocket of the workingman." Later many other carriers matched his low prices...
...proudest boast of Britain's Sir Freddie Laker is that he made transatlantic air travel affordable to the masses. For instance, his walk-on Laker Skytrain service from New York City to London costs only $250 one way, less than half of what most other airlines have been charging for even their economy-class tickets. But suddenly, Sir Freddie finds that he is facing stiff competition from one of the very airlines that his cutthroat pricing policies had siphoned business from in the first place: Pan American World Airways. Under its new chairman, C. Edward Acker, the loss-plagued...
...piston-powered DC4s and DC-6Bs were usually packed with Americans doing Europe on $5 a day. Business continued to boom after the line switched to nonstop jet service, which was still at cut rates. In 1977 Icelandic carried 240,000 passengers. But then came Freddie Laker's Skytrain flights and subsequent price slashing by the major airlines. Budget flyers could now skip both Reykjavik and Luxembourg and still save money. After losses of $15 million last year, Icelandair, its official name since 1979, slashed the number of transatlantic flights from 23 to 2 per week and laid...
...vacationers from the United Kingdom will have visited Miami Beach on daily flights by year's end, adding some $100 million to the economy of that fabled strip. They are lured to the U.S. by reasonable hotel rates and charter packages and Freddie Laker's Skytrain jet service. Inflation back home and the pound sterling's strong exchange rate against the dollar make Miami a splendid buy. According to the U.S. Travel Service, 1.25 million British tourists will visit the U.S. this year, a 25% increase over 1979. It is the first time since World...
...true on the airline's domestic flights. High praise goes to "the smiling Irish eyes" of Aer Lingus' stewardesses, though the non-Hibernian meals would be rejected at the lowliest Dublin pub. The guide also has high praise for Sir Freddie Laker and his pioneering, price-cutting Skytrain, "the most exciting development on the hitherto complacent transatlantic travel scene." The crews are smart and thoughtful, the meals attractively priced. "But, alas," reports Ronay, "it's the familiar story of dry meat, tasteless, watery vegetables, gray potatoes or a new horror, rubbery scrolls of pasta (and eaten with...