FLYBE, Southampton's biggest airline, is to launch a number of routes from Bournemouth, duplicating services for Hampshire.

Up to 300,000 seats to destinations such as Paris, Amsterdam, Manchester and Glasgow will be available for leisure and business travellers from Bournemouth Airport, which is 30 miles away.

The Daily Echo understands the Glasgow and Manchester services will be twice daily.

Southampton to Glasgow is the second busiest route at the Wide Lane airport, with 182,256 passengers a year.

Southampton Airport is the airline's largest regional base, but Bournemouth Airport is just 30 miles away.

Last year, Southampton saw almost 1.8m passengers through the terminal building, compared to 660,000 at Bournemouth.

When asked this morning, a spokesman from Southampton Airport said: “We’re continuing to look at what range of destinations are available for our passengers. We’re working with a range of airlines to build upon our success as a leading international airport.”

Andrew McConnell, director of communications at Flybe said the new centre at Bournemouth would have no impact at all on flights from Southampton.

“We see that operations in Bournemouth will complement our offering to passengers within the local area both within Southampton and Bournemouth.

“We see there’s demand and that’s why we’re able to provide these services.

“There’s a good operation at Southampton, we  have a very good relationship with the airport. It’s very good news to be able to operate more services to people in the South.”

Flights will operate to Glasgow from both Southampton and Bournemouth and a number of new destinations from the Dorset airport.

Mr McConnell added that there are no planned announcements for new routes from Southampton.

The announcement comes as Flybe reveals its latest set of results.

Saad Hammad CEO of Flybe said: “We are undertaking a measured approach to growth in the second half with our launch of new routes. We have announced that we will be opening new bases in Bournemouth and Aberdeen.

“While there are still a number of challenges ahead, Flybe enters the winter season with solid momentum in its core UK business.”

The carrier already has a major operation at Southampton Airport serving around 30 European and domestic routes.

One transport analyst said: “The routes to Paris and Amsterdam are especially exciting because both these capitals have hub airports which facilitate onwards connections to all parts of the world. This is great news for regional business and leisure travellers.”

It will be the biggest expansion of services at Bournemouth since the £50m investment in 2010/11 when a new departure terminal and arrivals hall were built.

The huge infrastructure upgrade by the owners, Manchester Airports Group, came just as the global economic downturn was at its peak.

The aviation sector was hit hard by a slump in demand and planned new routes from Bournemouth did not materialise.

Flybe launched a daily service to Manchester from Bournemouth in May 2010 but pulled the plug on it six months later because of lack of demand.

Currently Ryanair is the airport's biggest operator.