Lack of demand ends airline's Kerikeri route

North Shore Air has dropped flights from Kaitaia airport.

A new airline offering flights between Kerikeri and Auckland's North Shore - aimed at business travellers and North Shore residents keen to avoid Auckland traffic chaos - has dropped the service after just over a month of operation.

North Shore Air started flying between Kerikeri and North Shore on October 4 (Tauranga flights started a few days earlier, on September 28).

Later that month the daily flights dropped to three a week and on October 30 owner Peter Newman announced the end of North Shore Air's scheduled flights.

The company would still be available for charters.

Newman said it was a case of pulling out while the company could still manage an exit or waiting until it hit the wall.

The airline needed three to four passengers on each eight-seater plane to break even but most flights took off with a single passenger.

Newman said the $195 fare was one reason for the service's demise.

North Shore Air operated the service for just 33 days but it is not New Zealand's shortest-lived route.

That title, according to the civil aviation website 3rd Level New Zealand, goes to Coastal Airways which operated between Whenuapai, Whangarei, Kaikohe and Kaitaia for just 27 days in 1958.