A persistent trend has emerged in European airport traffic over the past quarter. While the overall passenger traffic at European airports continued to see an increase (+4.7%) in August 2011 compared with August 2010, the overall freight traffic among European airports decreased -2.5% in the same comparison. The overall figure for movements at European airports increased +2.7%…
A persistent trend has emerged in European airport traffic over the past quarter. While the overall passenger traffic at European airports continued to see an increase (+4.7%) in August 2011 compared with August 2010, the overall freight traffic among European airports decreased -2.5% in the same comparison. The overall figure for movements at European airports increased +2.7% in August 2011 when compared with August 2010.
However, year-to-date traffic figures still reveal overall positives for the first 8 months of this year (compared with the same period in 2010), with passengers registering an increase of +8.2%, freight an increase of +3.3% and movements an increase of +4.5%. Adjusted to reflect the exceptional impact of the volcanic ash crisis in 2010, passenger growth year to date stands at +4.8% and freight at just +1.6%.
Olivier Jankovec, Director General ACI Europe commented “Declining freight traffic is symptomatic of the risk of another recession for Europe, amid weak business and consumer confidence. This bodes badly for passenger traffic in the months ahead, with many airlines having revised their initial capacity plans downwards for the winter.”
He added “The gap between passenger traffic growth at EU airports (+3.5%) and non EU-airports (+9.6%) reflects market maturity to some degree, but also – worryingly – competitive disparities. Aviation taxes in the UK, Germany and Austria are taking a heavy toll on the industry, especially on regional airports. These countries clearly haven’t grasped that they are shooting themselves in the foot.”
Airports welcoming more than 25 million passengers per year (Group 1), airports welcoming between 10 and 25 million passengers (Group 2), airports welcoming between 5 and 10 million passengers (Group 3) and airports welcoming less than 5 million passengers per year (Group 4) reported an average increase of +4.4%, +5.7%, +4.4% and +3.4% respectively when compared with August 2010. The same comparison of August 2011 with August 2009 demonstrates an average increase of +8.0%, +13.0%, +13.1% and +13.6% respectively.
Examples of airports that experienced the highest increase in passenger traffic per group, when comparing August 2011 with August 2010, include:
– Group 1 airports – Barcelona (+19.1%), Istanbul IST (+13.3%), Amsterdam (+8.9%) and Munich (+4.7%)
– Group 2 airports – Moscow DME (+20.6%), Moscow SVO (+16.9%), Antalya (+15.1%) and Helsinki (+13.3%)
– Group 3 airports – Venice (+43.1%), Kiev (+16.8%), Tenerife TFS (+13.3%) and Gran Canaria (+12.1%)
– Group 4 airports – Ohrid (+93.5%), Tallinn (+39.5%), Skelleftea (+36.2%) and Vilnius (+26.3%)
The ‘ACI Europe Airport Traffic Report – August 2011’ includes 166 airports in total.
Theodore is the Co-Founder and Managing Editor of TravelDailyNews Media Network; his responsibilities include business development and planning for TravelDailyNews long-term opportunities.
