New Air Service Should

Boost Tourism In

Papua-New Guinea

From a Port Moresby Correspondent After years of dickering, the tourist industry in Papua-New Guinea at last appears to be on the threshold of real expansion.

The door will shortly be opened to world tourist traffic by means of a new air service connecting Sydney with Port Moresby, Hong Kong and Japan.

THE new route will enable travellers to visit New Guinea en route to somewhere else—something which they cannot do now unless they are

prepared to fight their way aboard small, heavily-booked aircraft operated by Fiji Airways and connecting Fiji with the Solomons.

The Commonwealth Government has made no firm decision on the new route, which has been applied for by Qantas, using 707 jets, once weekly.

The Qantas application was made last July, Since then Ansett-ANA has applied to operate a DC6 service from Port Moresby to Manila.

Obviously, both applications won’t be approved, and in the Territory the betting is heavily on Qantas, which is far better equipped to undertake such a service.

Qantas, however, insists on traffic rights between Sydney and Moresby —rights which are at present divided between TAA and Ansett, operating DC6’s.

Bright Spot

The domestic airlines are fighting the granting of these rights to Qantas. and won’t have Qantas competing on the Sydney-Moresby run even if Qantas charges higher rates for that sector, which apparently it is pre pared to do.

New Guinea people would natur ally prefer the advantages of the 707 as against the rumbling DC6 on the 1,800 miles from Sydney to Moresby, but even if they can’t get those ad vantages they would be more than

This sort of plane, a 707 jet, is what most people Qantas' rivals ex cepted would like to see on the Syd ney-Moresby run.

happy to see the direct connection with the East no matter who operated it.

Whoever does —and it will almost certainly be Qantas —the service should begin by the end of the year.

Territory travel agents regard the new service as a bright spot in what otherwise is a dull travel picture.

For some time these agents have been suffering from the lack of a direct air service out of the Terri tory.

It was once possible to go north through West New Guinea, but this has been stopped since the Indonesian takeover.

Agents report frequent cancella tions of overseas tour parties as soon as they learn that they will have to visit New Guinea through Australia and then return to Australia to get out.

Tourists want to see as much on their routes as they can take in dur ing stopovers, and they don’t like re tracing their steps, which they natur ally regard as an expensive waste.

Accommodation Lacking

Accommodation in the Territory is still a problem—there is not enough of it, and what there is, is too often of indifferent quality. But at last, too, something concrete seems about to be done to improve things.

Steamships Trading Co., is going ahead with plans for a luxury hotel at Lae, main centre for the internal air routes in New Guinea.

And in late February, Papuan Air lines Pty. Ltd,, Port Moresby air carrier, announced plans for a £170,000 hotel to be started almost immediately at Jackson’s Airport, Port Moresby, right next to the terminal. This hotel, The Gateway, was originally to be built with capital from both Patair and Ansett, but Ansett announced last year that it was withdrawing.

Mr. Cliff Jackson, the energetic managing director of Patair, went ahead anyhow and obtained the rest of the money from local sources.

Patair will own all the shares, through a new company being formed called Tourist Development Pty. Ltd.

The Gateway is planned along the lines of Fiji’s Mocambo, and will give 24-hour service (see panel). It is expected to be finished by June next year.

Travellers on the new route will then have a wider choice of hotels in Moresby. And once they can be in duced to stop over, they are cap tured—according to the growing Territory tourist interests.