SAVINGS PLAN
Don't hire a car if you're spending most of your time in European cities, parking fees are high, finding a space is difficult and public transport is fast and cheap.
THE BIG ISSUE
Do Aussies pay more a kilometre for their time in the air than those fortunate folks flying the skies of Europe or North America? Not according to Rome2rio, the Melbourne-based global, multimodal search specialist, which has recently released its 2016 Global Flight Pricing Ranking.
In a follow-up to its 2012 airline price survey, Rome2rio analysed the economy-class airfare data from searches performed on its website and came up with a cost per kilometre figure in US dollars for more than 200 airlines around the globe.
Among airlines operating on international routes, the data backs the Asia-based budget airlines as the cheapest to fly per kilometre, with Indonesian low-cost carrier Lion Airlines taking gold and Hong Kong Express and the Philippines CEBU Pacific Air completing the podium finishers.
Among the legacy carriers serving Australian cities, we're well up the league tables with Etihad in 13th place, followed immediately by Emirates, then Qatar at number 23 with Singapore Airlines and Cathay Pacific snapping at their heels. Qantas sits in 67th place at $0.14¢/km, still a respectable finish against other international carriers.
One useful outcome from the analysis of domestic airlines is the nation-by-nation comparison provided on Rome2rio's Lowest Priced Country by Average data, and here Aussies sit squarely in ninth place. Were it not for Regional Express, which skews the data with its cost/km of $0.47, which is almost four times the figure for Qantas, the price we pay a kilometre for domestic air travel would put us among the five least expensive countries.
