Skift Take
While demand for flights from China to the U.S. is down, it is rising to Canada, which is enjoying new peaks in Chinese arrivals. No Trump Slump in Canada, which is visa-friendly, welcoming and appealing to free-spirited millennials.
Editor's Note: Skift launched a series, Gateway, as we broaden our news coverage geographically with first-hand, original stories from correspondents embedded in cities around the world.
We started with regular reports several times per month from tourism hubs Beijing, Singapore and Capetown. Gateway Beijing and Gateway Singapore, for example, signify that the reporters are writing from those cities although their coverage of the business of travel will meander to other locales in their regions. Read about the series here, and check out all the stories in the series here.
It’s not just that arrivals to Canada from China are reaching new peaks. New direct flights launched over a year ago are showing positive effects. In particular, they swing the demographics to millennials and, because these travelers tend to be independent and free-spirited, this helps reshape tourism to beyond Vancouver and Toronto.
Direct services such as Hainan Airlines’ thrice-weekly Beijing-Calgary, which launched in June 2016, and Air China’s thrice-weekly Beijing-Montreal service, which began in September 2015 (the first transpacific direct link between Asia and Montreal), are a fillip for central and eastern Canada to nab a share of Chinese travelers.
And it’s millennials who are driving growth, says Destination Canada’s managing director-China, Derek
