Nashville airport food: 20 restaurants in 6 hours at BNA
Two Tennessean reporters take on all the locally owned spots along Nashville airport’s busiest concourse.
A new direct flight to Europe will take off from Nashville next spring, adding more opportunities for connections across the continent. Icelandair is launching a nonstop service to Iceland’s capital city Reykjavík out of Nashville International Airport on May 16, 2025.
“With BNA being our 18th gateway from North America, the flight from Nashville to our hub and our home will take less than seven hours from our convenient and efficient International Airport,” Icelandair Chief Commercial Officer Tomas Ingason said. “Passengers will be able to connect onwards to more than 30 destinations across Europe.”
The new route connects Nashville with Icelandair’s entire European network, including Amsterdam, Berlin, Copenhagen, London and Paris.
City, state and airport leadership said the new flight bodes well for economic development and tourism in Nashville.
Metro Nashville Airport Authority President and CEO Doug Kreulen said the projected economic impact of the first year of this service is between $29.2 million and $36.3 million.
“We’ve been waiting to get to Iceland,” he said. “We try to sell them on Tennessee and on Nashville, and we’re lucky that the Icelandair team picked us.”
When the inaugural Icelandair flight takes off from BNA in May, it will be filled with 16 premium and 144 economy passengers. Tickets for the first flight are already on sale, ranging in cost from $323 to $1,056.
Economic and Community Development Commissioner Stuart McWhorter said the flight will increase the ability of over 1,000 Tennessee-based international businesses to engage in commerce across the globe.
“I feel confident that today’s announcement in this new direct service will serve as catalyst for continued economic development growth in our state, in Nashville in particular, and will certainly create a ripple effect,” McWhorter said.
In 2023, 144 million visitors traveled to Tennessee and generated $30 billion in visitor spending, McWhorter said, adding that international travelers contribute significantly to those numbers.
President and CEO of the Nashville Convention and Visitors Corp. Deana Ivey said arrivals from Iceland to the U.S. are projected to skyrocket in the coming years, and she thinks Nashville will benefit from them.
“Iceland is often seen as a gateway between North America and Europe,” Ivey said. “We’ve already invested heavily as the tourism department in marketing and sales trips across Europe, and this new connection perfectly complements those efforts.”
Recruiting Icelandair to BNA has been in the works for some time. Nashville’s air service team connected with Icelandair officials at a global aviation conference in 2023. Kreulen said those kinds of events are for “speed dating” with new airlines, and Nashville International Airport had the data to support a demand for a new route to Europe.
Kreulen said about 2,100 people travel internationally out of Nashville every day, and of those passengers, 750 are going to Europe. Currently, British Airways is the only airline that flies to Europe out of Nashville, and Kreulen said Icelandair saw an opportunity.
Icelandair has newly partnered with Southwest Airlines, which has steadily increased its presence in Nashville. Southwest added six direct flights out of Nashville earlier this week and plans to launch a new flight crew base at BNA next spring.
Thursday’s announcement comes just after the one-year anniversary of BNA’s new International Arrivals Facility, which was part of the $1.62 billion BNA Vision expansion program.
Now, the airport has moved into the $1.5 billion New Horizon phase of its growth plan, which will include a new Concourse A, an expanded Concourse D and transportation infrastructure around the airport. The new concourses are planned for completion in 2028.
Hadley Hitson covers trending business, dining and health care for The Tennessean. She can be reached at hhitson@gannett.com. To support her work, subscribe to The Tennessean.
Source link : https://www.tennessean.com/story/money/2024/09/26/nashville-flights-icelandair-adds-reykjavk/75383275007/
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Publish date : 2024-09-26 07:00:00
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