Buenos Aires' Downtown Airport (AEP) Gets Long Haul Flights

As a practical matter, it's also super helpful for connections - in the status quo, if you're transferring between an international and domestic flight, you almost always need to change airports, and the city of BA is between them.

Doesn't their press release say that the Miami flight has four outbounds and three returns weekly? How does that work?

Assuming that the fourth flight comes back to EZE, how does that plane end up getting between airports?

"especially given how bad traffic can be in Buenos Aires"
Off topic but compared to São Paulo, Buenos Aires traffic is a paradise.
From GRU to the city center it's less than 50km and most times it takes me hours to go downtown. I believe my record is 4+h. Depending on my departure hour I even go to GRU in the very early morning to avoid traffic, even during night it never took me less than 1h. But still, I prefer to spend 4h in the lounge rather than 2h in traffic.

This is definitely great news, in particular for those connecting from other regional cities. AR has mostly eliminated regional services to EZE, so connecting involves an airport change.

Also, the opening of the new departure terminal at EZE has made things clearly worse. The centralized security and passport control is clearly unable to cope with the traffic volume.

I made it to GRU one evening in under an hour. Mind you, the cab driver drove like Senna, on the road named after him, and I had to keep shouting at him to slow down.

This is a huge deal.

This is GREAT news!

Are you saying that AR can just fly into AEP while AA, UA, & DL must use EZE? That's like BA using LHR while Delta, Northwes, USairways & Continental must all use Gatwick.

Yeah, you have some cab guys like that overthere. Sometimes they help us out. 😉

Um…are you flying to London in 1999? Northwest, USairways and Continental haven’t existed for some years now…

I'd be curious to know if the overall airport experience is better at AEP or EZE. Lounges / modern terminals / etc.

I think the comment is specifically referencing the decades that Bermuda II limited the carriers allowed to operate into LHR, giving BA (and PA) a major advantage.

The 767-300ER with 60k engines and the 787-8 could probably both make it to Miami. The chances of making JFK without payload restrictions and AR’s configuration is low

Way worst in that aspect… there is only one lounge located before security and very limited access for American Express cards only… it’s not clear yet if AR business class passengers will get acces, since all domestic and regional flights from AR don’t have a business class, just premium economy and they don’t get access, nor do Skyteam elite plus customers

“Um…are you flying to London in 1999?”

God, I wish I was

A minor issue compared to the convenience on several fronts

Guessing the state airline gets an advantage here on keeping the other airlines out

Great news for those connecting to other points in Argentina, or stopping in the city. It's a small airport and nothing fancy, but 15 minutes into the heart of the city can't be beat.

EZE would be the winner here. It has been expanded and modernized in recent years, has more lounges, and really isn't that inconvenient, just a bit further out. AEP went through a significant overhaul several years ago, but it is still small and congested. The AR routes to JFK and MIA operating from AEP have nothing to do with passenger experience and a lot to do with competitiveness. This is the Argentine government's way of pushing back on AA and the US carriers, who dominate the US-Argentina air market.

Exit passport control at EZE is a clown show.

It can possibly be worse at AEP, can it?

Though it’s great for connections, I worry about congestion in the terminal. Lines are already prohibitively long (60 min, plus) just to check in for domestic flights, and pax are lined up through hallways.

It looks like they are ending JFK-EZE flights at around the same time. I suppose they are not ending MIA-EZE flights either because it is such a high-demand route. I feel like they should still keep flights from EZE to both places because it seems like EZE offers more opportunities for connections. For those who are more familiar with AEP, where does it generally fall on the spectrum of all city-center airports in the world? Is it more of a London City or a Tokyo Haneda kind of situation?

I flew Aerolineas Argentinas business class on their A330 from Miami to Buenos Aires and man, that was the worst business class experience I’ve had. The food was inedible and the entertainment was super limited. The seats also weren’t lie flat. It was nice to fly direct though from Miami.

it might end up like the narita -haneda issue. if only argentine airlines are allowed the usa-dot will boycott them until usa airlines are given the same privilege (unfair competition law)

Most straightforward way would be to have an EZE-MIA flight that is the other way around (3 outbound, 4 returns) so that planes are basically rotating between the two airports.

I believe ANA did something similar with HND/NRT flights to certain US cities during the pandemic.

Correct. One plane is routed AEP-MIA-EZE. The rest all do AEP-MIA-AEP or EZE-MIA-EZE.