JLA bucks Euro trend as passenger capacity grows

by Neil Hodgson, Liverpool Daily Post
Nov 25 2009

LIVERPOOL John Lennon Airport is bucking the trend of its European peers and reporting strong growth in capacity.

A report by industry specialist website Airline Network News and Analysis (ANNA) looked at seat capacity at Europe’s top 600 airports at the beginning of the winter season, covering October to March next year.

Overall, it claims capacity has dropped just 2%.

However, it singles out the UK, France and the Irish Republic as among the worst hit.

UK airports are seeing capacity cuts of more than 5%, France is almost 10% down compared with the same period last year, while the Irish Republic has seen a drop of almost 20%.

Recent figures from travel insurer InsureandGo revealed that London has suffered more route losses than any other European capital, with as many as 76 routes being cut from April,2008, to October, 2009.

That amounts to the loss of 646 flights and more than 895,000 seats a week.

The ANNA report said: “London Gatwick has recovered some ground lost last year thanks to more new Easyjet services and the development of a base by Irish flag carrier Aer Lingus. However, nearly all other major UK airports are down between 5% and 15%, the notable exception being Liverpool, which is up 13%.”

Liverpool’s main carriers are Easyjet and Ryanair which continue to invest in new routes.

Last week, Ryanair announced three new flights to Italy and Poland, and yesterday Easyjet announced its 24th JLA route to Malta from next June. JLA spokesman Robin Tudor said: “This report deals with capacity and the question is how much of this availability sells?

“We are delighted to see this growth, but that is only half the story and we have to work with the airlines to make sure these routes sell.”

The ANNA report speculated that Ireland’s huge drop in capacity could be due to the imposition of a 10 euro tax on air travel earlier this year, similar to the UK’s £11 Air Passenger Duty charge.

It added: “Denmark and the Netherlands have already reversed their decisions to introduce taxes on air travel. How long before Ireland does the same?”