Australian low-fare carrier Jetstar Airways is to introduce the only direct flights between Adelaide and the Sunshine Coast from the final quarter of this year ahead of the spring school holidays in South Australia. The expansion has been made possible by the redeployment of resources within the airline’s network and rebalancing capacity in response to market demand.

The introduction of the three times weekly Adelaide – Sunshine Coast route from September 30, 2016 will increase Jetstar’s domestic offer into the Sunshine Coast to three routes and will be the second new route to be added from Adelaide in the last six months after Avalon flights launched in March.

The link will be operated using a 180-seat Airbus A320 and is being launched to meet growing demand for holidays to the region. It marks the carrier’s return to a market it previously served between March 2006 and July 2008, according to schedules data from OAG.

The Sunshine Coast will be Jetstar’s fourth direct Queensland destination from Adelaide. The budget airline already offers direct flights between Adelaide and Brisbane, Cairns and the Gold Coast.

Jetstar Airways’ head of commercial and operations improvement, Carly Povey, said the decision to add the new route has been driven by the success of the airline’s existing flights into Sunshine Coast from Melbourne and Sydney.

“The Sunshine Coast is one of our most popular leisure destinations. On the Sunshine Coast, we now offer three times more flights than our competitor and this cements our position as the leading airline servicing the region,” she said.

In total Jetstar will now offer more than 10,000 seats to the Sunshine Coast each week, with three return flights from Adelaide, 25 return flights from Melbourne and up to 31 return flights from Sydney. Jetstar’s new flights represent over 56,000 additional seats between Adelaide and Maroochydore every year.

“This is a tremendous show of support for our region from Jetstar and we can’t wait to see more South Australians enjoying their holidays here. The flights also provide an opportunity for locals to sample the delights that South Australia has to offer,” said Sunshine Coast Deputy Mayor Cr Tim Dwyer, highlighting the inbound and outbound flows expected on the route.

Traffic data from Sabre Market Intelligence highlights how Jetstar Airways helped stimulate the Adelaide - Sunshine Coast market when it previously served the route in the last decade. Annual O&D passengers grew to over 40,000 passengers, according to the statistics.