Business View Caribbean | May 2016

34 May 2016 - Business View Caribbean Business View Caribbean - May 2016 35 Today, tourists still stream into the British Virgin Is- lands, Fraser notes, “but the majority of them are fly- ing into neighboring islands – St. Thomas, basically – and coming over by boat.” And, for most trav- elers, this just makes better economic sense. “If you were in the BVI, or if you were in Miami and wanted to come to the BVI, you would have to make at least one stop over in San Juan,” he says. “Now, a price for that, compared to a price from St. Thomas - which takes you direct- ly to Miami - is considerably different. Some- times it can be even half the price to go out of St. Thomas. And the boat fare is not very sig- nificant, so passengers have been taking that route. What we would like to do is bring back those passengers directly from Miami to Beef Island, with cheaper fares and without having to go through the U.S. Virgin Islands.” Another initiative for the BVIAA, according to Fraser, is to put in place a major statistical unit that will help it to gather statistics in a more meaningful way. “We do collect statistics, now, but we think that Enjoy the ride. Fly when you want to withmore choices for fast, daily flights here in the BVI and throughout the Caribbean. Connections in San Juan are a breeze, too. capeair.com 284-495-2100 800-CAPE-AIR Enjoy the ride. San Juan Mayagüez Vieques Culebra St.Thomas St.Croix Tortola Virgin Gorda Seasonal routes. that’s an area we really need to focus on,” he says, “because we would need this information for any fu- ture development. We really need to have a robust way to know not only passengers’ point of origin, we need to know how many stops they’ve made to get here, his- torical patterns, trends, and so forth. We just want to make it as comprehensive as possible. That is one of the things, in addition to the expansion, that we hope to have in place.” But making the BVI accessible to the rest of the world via large, long-mile aircraft, within the next four years, is still BVIAA’s major goal. And while awaiting the run- way expansion that will accommodate the larger com- mercial airlines, Fraser says that BVI Airways, operat- ing a smaller craft that can utilize the current runway, will begin direct flights to Miami, this October. “Also, we’re going to be having Fletch Air, a subsidiary of VLM Airlines, connecting to the islands down south for our European visitors,” he adds, reminding one and