Direct Flight to Cuba Taking Off From JFK in March

Direct Flight to Cuba Taking Off From JFK in March
By Aidan Gardiner on February 4, 2015 2:54pm
@aidangardiner

QUEENS — Starting in March, New Yorkers will be able to hop on a direct
flight from JFK airport to Havana, Cuba, for just under $850, organizers
said.

California-based Cuba Travel Services will start running weekly Tuesday
afternoon flights on a 737 out of New York on March 17 for $779, the
charter flight company said.

The fare will be $849 every week thereafter.

"It's obviously very, very exciting. The more cities we have connecting
the United States to Cuba, the better," said the company's head of
marketing, Emily Sanchez. "We've been excited to do it for quite a
while, we've just been waiting for the right time.

"Culturally speaking, New York and Cuba are so close. We wanted to
bridge that gap."

The charter flight package, which has been in the works for about a
year, was supposed to run out of Newark airport, but officials there
denied Cuba Travel so they went with JFK, staff said. It's not known why
Newark nixed the flight.

"The Cuban airport authorities were pretty open to granting a permit.
They were excited. They wanted to make it work," Sanchez said.

Requests for comment from the Port Authority, which operates JFK
airport, were not immediately returned.

Travel restrictions are still in effect for Americans so only those who
fall into the 12 categories permitted by the US government will be able
to book Cuba Travel flights.

Those categories include people traveling to Cuba for family visits, to
do government work, journalism and several other limited categories.

The recent normalization of diplomatic relations between the United
States and Cuba, while exciting, didn't have any direct impact on their
New York flight plan, Sanchez said.

Federal legislators however have proposed lifting all travel bans to Cuba.

Cuba Travel already runs about 20 flights a week out of Miami and Tampa,
Sanchez said.

For now, the company is only planning the one flight per week from JFK.

"We have no plans any time soon to expand New York service. We're just
getting our feet wet," Sanchez said.

Source: Direct Flight to Cuba Taking Off From JFK in March - South
Jamaica - DNAinfo.com New York -
http://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20150204/south-jamaica/direct-flight-cuba-taking-off-from-jfk-march