The implementation of national travel assistance has brought renewed attention to domestic travel.
JAL, which has bases throughout Japan, has been continuously implementing regional revitalization initiatives (currently the “JAL Furusato Project”). In August 2020, flight attendants selected through an internal application process moved to the area and launched the “JAL Furusato Ambassadors” to promote regional initiatives, and in In December of the same year, JAL appointed “JAL hometown supporters,” who are involved in regional revitalization while serving on board. The aim is to develop products and solve regional issues for hometowns and other regions with which they have connections, utilizing the knowledge they have accumulated as flight attendants.
We spoke with Junko Kimura, a JAL Furusato Ambassador who is involved in the Workcation FAM tour in Ehime.
–What can you tell us about your initiatives?
Imabari City in Ehime Prefecture is promoting work tours to offer a new style of travel, and as part of this effort, a work experience tour was planned, with a total of 45 JAL employees participating on five separate occasions.
Imabari City is located on the Ehime Prefecture side of the “Shimanami Kaido,” a cycling route that attracts many cyclists, so we also verified a workcation for cyclists and conducted a demonstration experiment of a dedicated bicycle box called SBCON. The SBCON was used to transport bicycles from Haneda Airport to Matsuyama Airport by air, and cyclists were able to travel to Imabari by bicycle immediately upon arrival at Matsuyama Airport.
*SBCON: A dedicated bicycle transportation box developed by JAL in collaboration with Setouchi Tourism Promotion Organization and S-WORKS. It enables storage with minimal disassembly, greatly reducing the risk of damage during transportation (in addition to bicycles, helmets and shoes can be stored).
–How are you involved in this effort?
In collaboration with Imabari City and Setouchi Shimanami Reading, I was involved in the planning and production of JAL’s internal recruitment and planning for the Workcation FAM tour. The final tour was limited to cyclists and runners, and included a workcation on Omishima Island, which is located on the Shimanami Kaido, to identify issues such as whether cyclists can travel comfortably with their beloved cars.
–What are your future plans and prospects?
We would like to further cooperate with Imabari City and help promote workcation projects in the Imabari-Shimanami area in the future. The Shimanami Kaido is famous as a sacred place for cyclists. We will continue to promote the unique charm that exists only in the Shimanami area.
We would like to contribute to the creation of more attractive work vacation tours by resolving the issues we have learned from this year’s demonstration experiment. In the future, we aim to create a work vacation style where passengers board an airplane with a single JAL Card and immediately get on their car (bicycle) upon arrival at the airport to go to their destination.
–What is your message to travelers?
If you are a cyclist, you must visit the Shimanami Kaido at least once. Not only do we invite you to ride along the Shimanami Kaido, but we also invite you to stay in the Geyo Islands and experience a vacation. The island where the treasure of the Murakami pirates may lie, the wonderful food including Kurushima sea bream, and the sunset over the Shimanami. Come and discover your own unique scenery that you won’t find in any guidebooks or on the Internet.
© Source travel watch