CORPORATE TRAVEL
BOA R DING PA S S
All the latest news for the busy EA organising corporate travel
Popular
travel app
Google Trips
retired
Sydney adopts solution for
visually impaired travellers
Sydney Airport has now launched a
partnership with Aira, a service that
enables blind and low vision travellers
to confidently navigate the airport
through a smartphone connection.
The free service for passengers
works via a smartphone app on any iOS
or Android device. The app connects
the traveller to a trained professional
called an Aira Agent, who then
provides on-demand, personalised
access to visual information.
Jack Tyrrell, a regular Sydney-
based traveller, used Aira for the first
time recently while departing Sydney
Airport. “When I need to go to the
airport, I normally just go straight from
the train station to my boarding gate,
as I’m not able to distinguish what’s
around. Using Aira for the first time,
I was able to learn where things were
and realised the full offering of the
airport,” said Mr Tyrrell.
Vision Australia CEO Ron Hooton
said that the technology makes the
world instantly more accessible as more
than 380,000 people in Australia are
blind or have low vision. “It’s always
pleasing when organisations take steps
to improve accessibility and Sydney
Airport becoming an Aira Access
location is great news.” S
Air New Zealand invests in
‘fuel efficient’ Dreamliners
Air New Zealand has announced they
will be purchasing eight new Boeing
787-10 Dreamliner aircraft, which the
airline claim will save 190,000 tonnes
of carbon emissions per year.
At market value the eight planes are
worth $2.5 billion, which represents
a significant investment by New
Zealand’s flag carrier. The new aircraft
will replace Air New Zealand’s fleet of
42 Chief of Staff | Issue 3 2019
eight 777-200 planes, which will be
phased out by 2025. The new 787-10s
are expected to be 25 percent more fuel
efficient than the older 777-200’s.
Air New Zealand also currently
operates a fleet of 13 787-9 Dreamliners,
which Chief Executive Christopher
Luxon said have proved to be the
perfect aircraft for the airline’s Pacific
Rim focus. S
Google’s popular travel app,
Google Trips, will be retired by
5 August and combined with a
number of the tech giant’s other
travel services on one online
only platform called ‘Trips’. The
original app has been downloaded
over five million times from the
Playstore, and was highly rated by
consumers with 4.1 stars.
Google plans to combine
all of its travel related services
(including Google Flights,
Google Hotels and more) into
one website: google.com/travel.
According to Google’s Vice
President of Travel Product
Management, Richard Holden,
the merger is a measure designed
to make the service more
comprehensive for the traveller.
“The number of tools and
amount of information you need
to sift through when deciding
where to go, where to stay and
what flight to take can be time
consuming and overwhelming.
That’s why today, we’re
simplifying the way we help
travellers plan trips with Google
across devices,” said Mr Holden.
The change doesn’t come
without criticism, as some are
questioning the new browser-
based platform’s ability to
function when out of service, and
are concerned about the privacy
risk with the site’s new tracking
metrics. Mr Holden says there is
an opt out available to customers,
“If you don’t want to see private
results, you can opt out by
adjusting your results and web &
app activity settings.” S