The recovery and growth of Florida's economy
Just a month after El Al airlines of Israel announced its intention to relocate its U.S. base from New York to Florida, Virgin Atlantic Airways has announced on July 6 that it will launch a daily service between London, England and Tampa, Florida from November of this year.
The service will start out on November 3 with 4 flights per week, ramping up to a daily service by the end of November 2022. It signifies another landmark point in not only the recovery of travel and tourism, but the expansion and growth of tourism in Florida following the pandemic.
Indeed, airports have recently struggled to cope with the volume of passengers wanting to get back to travelling as normal.
UK travelers can experience the "vibrant and growing city of Tampa"
Commenting on Virgin Atlantic's decision to increase their destinations in Florida to include Tampa, Dana Young, president and chief executive of Visit Florida had this to say:
“Expanding flight options and exposure to destinations throughout Florida is vital to maintaining and strengthening the UK’s position as our number-one market for overseas visitation. This new Virgin Atlantic service will provide more opportunities for UK travellers to experience the vibrant and growing city of Tampa, which offers a dynamic food scene, sports, arts and culture and much more.”
The announcement certainly means that more tourists and business travellers from the UK and Europe can access Tampa and all that Hillsborough County has to offer.
Expanding within Florida
Virgin Atlantic already offers direct flights from London to Miami and Orlando - both popular options for British tourists. The inclusion of Tampa as another direct destination that can now be reached by leisure and business travellers from the UK must surely be seen as a win for the Florida economy.
According to the planned schedule, Virgin will offer 190,000 passenger seats between London and Tampa each year, which represents a huge addition of prospective visitors to the sunshine state.
With TSA statistics suggesting that passenger numbers have almost recovered to pre-pandemic levels (and in the case of June 30 and July 1 - numbers exceeded those from the same days in 2019) it seems like the travel and tourism business is almost fully recovered!
Will you benefit from a new direct air travel route between London and Tampa? Do you feel like the travel and tourism economy has recovered to pre-pandemic levels? Let me know in the comments section below.
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