QCOSTARICA — While Costa Rica’s Executive and Legislative Branches battle out a bill for low fares in Central America, one of the airlines serving the region, Colombia flag airline Avianca, announced the launch of a new route that will directly connect San José, Costa Rica, with Managua, Nicaragua, starting on May 11.
The airline said the new route will have four flights per week on an Airbus A320 with a seating capacity of 180 passengers. This will result in a total of 1,440 available seats each week for travelers in Costa Rica to commute between the two destinations.
Flights will be on Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays and Sundays.
“We are very pleased to offer a new option for Costa Ricans to travel non-stop to Managua. In this way, we are shortening distances, facilitating tourism and commercial exchange between these two cities and promoting direct connectivity to and from Costa Rica,” said Rolando Damas, Avianca Sales Director for North America, Central America and the Caribbean.
For his part, William Rodriguez, Minister of Tourism, said: “This is a very interesting route, a direct connection without stops between both cities. We extend our congratulations to Avianca, we wish them the best results and total success on this new route for the benefit of future travelers.”
Currently, Avianca and Panama’s Copa Airlines offers daily flights between San José and Managua, Avianca making a stop in El Salvador and Copa in Panama. Costa Rica’s carrier, Sansa has several direct weekly flights between San Jose and Managua, on planes.
The current cost is between US$500 and US$700, return.
It is yet unclear if legislators will be successful in “resealing” the approved and vetoed by President Rodrigo Chaves, for US$50 dollar each-way fares between Costa Rica and Nicaragua, Panama, El Salvador, and Guatemala and US$60 between Costa Rica and the Dominican Republic.