NEWS FLASH
Niš Constantine the Great Airport has registered its busiest February on record by handling 27.347 passengers, representing an increase of 24.4% on last year. During the first two months of 2018, the airport welcomed 55.806 travellers through its doors, up 30.8%, while the number of aircraft movements stood at 204. It anticipates handling over 400.000 passengers this year and has projected strong growth over the coming period, with up to 650.000 travellers expected in 2021. The airport is now served by Wizz Air, Ryanair and Swiss International Air Lines on a year-round basis. Wizz has so far announced plans to launch new flights between Vienna and Niš this November, while Swiss will add an extra weekly service from Zurich for a total of three per week. The airport is seeking flights to several European cities including Paris, Oslo, Geneva, Frankfurt, Istanbul and Moscow.
| Month | PAX | Change (%) |
|---|---|---|
| JAN | 28.459 | ▲ 37.5 |
| FEB | 27.347 | ▲ 24.4 |
Well done, Nish!
ReplyDeleteGreetings from Sofia!
Good news for Niš
DeleteINI is growing really nicely. If they manage to pass 400.000 passenger mark then it will be a major success.
ReplyDeleteInterestingly Wizz Air will use its A321 from VIE!
I still hope BVA might be next.
I would say half a million. This is all bad news for SKP. INI-VIE and INI-BTS are hurting SKP-VIE route.
DeleteHAahahaha 😂😂😂
DeleteOf course. All of southern Serbia that used to fly to Vienna from SKP no longer has to do it.
DeleteI think the biggest blow to SKP was LX in INI.
But luckily we see numbers growing on all airports in the region! Many reasons to be happy!
Deletenot only INI-VIE is hurting SKP-VIE, but INI will also overtake not only SKP but SOF and BEG and will be head to head with FRA.
Deleteand yes, LX in INI was such a blow to SKP- both Germania which flies with A321 and Edelweis with A320 will cancel flights to/from SKP...
in summary: STOP trolling about INI!
You can be sarcastic all you want but at the end of the day INI is rapidly growing and airlines like LX are making it while SKP can only pull off Germania which is known as gasterbajter express.
DeleteAnon 12:31, I think you have a bad day, take some rest.
DeleteWhy are you so negative towards INI? Just because it's a true success story doesn't mean you have to compare it with the bigger boys. Even if it overtakes BEG, SOF or SKP, what's the deal? This is not a racing competition. Thank you.
the trolling is nevertheless improving:
Deletenow INI is only a serious blow to SKP, up until recently it was "that is will overtake SKP in 1 year, latest in 2 years"
p.s. the INI-VIE route which is allegedly hurting SKP can only start hurting SKP once it commences- which is in 8 months from now!
Omg I now INI raised from the ashes like Phoenix, but it is not that is LHR!
DeleteBtw. I'm not the same person that started moaning about your overconfidence bias in terms of INI!
You tell us why you're so angry? Are you jealous that the airport is doing well and the south developing? Also, the airport manager is clever and has a plan to further develop INI.
DeleteI would not be surprised if it gets even 3 airbridges.
Maybe Ellinair from Crete this summer?
ReplyDeleteThat would be cool! But it is a bit late to announce it. maybe next summer. There is definitely a space to have some seasonal/charter flights to Greece.
DeleteI think istanbul will be very popular if it happens, serbian diaspora in turkey have strong ties to raska region
ReplyDeleteI think Pegasus from SAW might be the best option.
DeletePegasus would offer connection possibilities but Turkish would be by far better solution. Their growth in Belgrade is obstructed anyway.
DeletePegasus would make a lot of sense since they don't fly to SOF.
DeleteIs Nis in top 10 airports so far this year?
ReplyDeleteyes, it will be-in your dreams
DeleteHe is asking for the first two months, not for the whole year.
DeleteTriple daily INI to SKP might work?
ReplyDeletehahahaha
Delete6 daily would be really appreciated by passengers transferring in both cities :)
DeleteINI airport has prooved to be the best performing regional airport in the entire ex-YU followed by TZL. It is just incredible how they went from zero to hero. Bravo INI, Bravo Srbija! Браво Србија!
ReplyDeleteI think their biggest acomplishment was getting four airlines to launch flights:
Delete1. Wizz Air
2. Ryanair
3. Swiss
4. Turkish Airlines Cargo
Yes but lets not forget that EIN is ending soon, and who knows will FR keep BTS after W6 flights to VIE kick off? I˙m kinda sad there were more new filghts for this year. Still hoping for newcomers like Pobeda, Norwegian, Pegasus, Eurowings...
ReplyDeleteRyan might opt to launch Paris once they stop BTS.
DeleteFR have already launched winter 2018 timetable INI-BTS...just thought you'd know.
Deletewell why shouldnt they?
DeleteWow, they will compete almost directly :)
DeleteFR has launched its winter timetable for all its INI destinations! I am hoping for W6 to base an aircraft asap.
DeleteWith EIN ending it would be great to see Transavia starting AMS!
DeleteI am still amazed Swiss is flying to INI :D
ReplyDeleteAny news on INI raising taxes?
Thumbs up INI. Always good to read positive news.
ReplyDeleteIs there any room for LH to use LH regional for Frankfurt flights? If coordinated well with Swiss they could offer (almost) daily connections to North America and numerous other destinations.
ReplyDeleteEW from MUC would make sense especially since they failed in SKP like LX did.
Deletesure, thats exactly why carriers would start flights to INI...not
DeleteWell that's the exact reasons why they didn't end up flying to SKP. ;)
Deleteoh give us a break
DeleteOr EW from Munich. Lots of connections.
DeleteFor me the most impressive is that February is almost as strong as January!
ReplyDelete+1
Delete+1
DeleteWhen you take into account the number of days, February is stronger.
DeleteReason is probably Serbian national day (Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday) and the February school break.
DeleteCould be, though it wasn't the case at BEG.
DeleteBecause BEG has much more people coming in or traveling during New Year and Christmas.
DeleteJP should send one of their small planes daily to INI and connect it to Europe.
ReplyDeleteJU should send it too 3x daily to feed its network (with completely legal state aid for that). But...
DeleteOU could also, on the days there are no Swiss operated flights, thus complementing the Star Alliance offer. Would be quite important for business travellers *heard Swiss is selling its business clas to INI quite well).
DeleteYet again, they will tell you that INI is only a 2h drive to BEG. What if I want to fly FROM INI?
DeleteBEG-INI has not only transfer traffic connection but domestic one too!
@anon 3:40
DeleteExactly, one could come for meetings/lunch/shopping and return in the evening.
Central Nis to Belgrade airport is definitely not 2h if you are driving safely and respecting the speed limit. Add possible traffic jam in Belgrade and it could easily go to 3.5h
Do you think there would be sufficient demand with tickets around 30-50 eur?
The challenge is scheduling flight rightly for people to be able to fly from Belgrade in the morning to do business in the South and return in the afternoon/evening.
What about a ATR spending the night in INI, so that early departure to BEG would be good for connecting flights? With very late night return to INI.
DeleteYes, but that is only convenient to some of transit passengers and only in one way. You must have some flights in between if you want people flying from Belgrade to the South to do business and return the same day, as well as for transfers. Basically, you need to have 3 flights a day each way on working days with the plane spending night in INI.
DeleteAre you suggesting that someone from BEG could transfer in INI? To where?
DeleteIf someone from Beograd wants to do business in Niš only for a day, for now they will have to spend the night in Niš.
You are asking way too much if you want three flights a day to Niš.
Do W6 have the right to operate domestic routes within Serbia? They already do in Bulgaria and Romania where routes seem successful e.g. SOF-VAR, OTP-CLJ
DeleteNo, not in Serbia. BG & RO are in EU.
DeleteNobody mentioned transferring in Nis :)
DeleteThose transferring in Belgrade would need more frequencies during the day for a route to make sense. I suppose turnaround BEG -INI -BEG would be around 2h. Therefore the schedule would have to be something like 5AM INI-BEG to enable connections in the morning wave.
7AM BEG-INI-BEG for those travelling to the South to do business and INI connections to Abu Dhabi, Sarajevo, Podgorica...etc.
Again around 17.30 BEG-INI-BEG taking transfers to INI (some with longer wait) and returning those doing business back to BEG.
Finally, late 0.30 AM departure BEG-INI with plane spending few hours there before early morning departure.
Costly, but hay - that is how you provide connectivity to citizens.
Constructive/non INI hating amendments/suggestions anticipated.
"if you want people flying from Belgrade to the South to do business and return the same day, as well as for 'transfers'."
DeleteSo that would be 4 flights a day from INI to BEG? Holy smokes man, hold your horses. We don't got even one flight a day. First lets go with two daily, early morning and late evening retun. If that works, then we add one mid-day flight.
DeleteJU can only starts BEG FRA INI FRA BEG. It is short one. Ili Stuttgart moze EW.
Delete@anon 6:46
Deletetransfers meaning those transferring in BEG and returning to INI. Maybe I wrote it in a bit confusing manner. :)
@anon 6:51
It would actually be three flights daily each way. That is needed if you want to have people transferring. Plus with cheap tickets you could have a completely new BEG-INI market for O&D.
I agree, I think JU needs to start BEG-INI soon, I mean two daily at first, or they will lose out at INI. It appears now that there is a good demand from Niš and Southern Serbia for flights to Western Europe and probably to Russia and the East as well.
DeleteThey must start these flights before OU, JP or OS does.
To make this reality, JU can easily do 3 daily from Mon-Fri and 1 during the weekends to ensure business, leisure and transfer travel.
DeleteMost bigger countries have domestic flights, time for Serbia to do it too.
JU was unable to make BEG-BUD work... It's a much more obvious market than BEG-INI (other choices to BUD are 5-6 hours on a bus or 8 hours on train, and the BUD traveler is certainly willing/able to pay more than INI) and still they failed. So unfortunately I don't see how INI could ever work.
Delete"BUD traveler is certainly willing/able to pay more than INI". Than is not necessarily the case. Companies south of Novi Sad do not do much business with Hungary (there are certainly exceptions). And again, AS tried the hub model with insufficient frequencies plus high fares for O&D travel. If they offered Budapest for 60 eur return they might not have fail.
DeleteI'd say there is much more traffic, in every sense, between Beograd/ Vojvodina, & Niš/S. Serbia, than between Bdg and Budapest.
DeleteDoesn't matter what bigger countries do, matters what is best for Serbia.
DeleteIs there domestic travel in Hungary, which is bigger & richer than Serbia?
Well, sure, if JU offered BUD for 6 EUR return they would be chock full. The problem is, they have a cost structure that the ticket prices need to support. That same cost structure is in place for INI. If JU offered INI for 3 EUR return they could certainly make it work but this is not what we are talking about here. Imagine instead a 60 EUR return (something you say would be reasonable to BUD) to INI. This is a perfectly reasonable price point for such a short flight for an airline like JU. How many seats do you think you'll sell? I think you would be flying pretty much empty.
Delete@AnonymousMarch 8, 2018 at 8:05 PM
DeleteI think we might agree. The "best for Serbia" would actually be to have a national carrier flying from its base to all airports in the country (two at the moment) and possibly have 4 flights a day.
So we all finally agree that Serbian domestic flights are needed?! We repeated this one hundred times - INI is an airport with a LOT of potential and demand but people just cannot get it and sadly the JU management focused on silly destinations with more competition. INI has few competition, why don't they just fly here?
Delete@anon 8:14
DeleteI was talking about BEG-BUD for 60 eur return. If I remember correctly is was regularly 150+ and of course it failed. Nobody mentioned 6/3 eur, it is not flixbus. But lets discuss our dear INI :)
I don't think the idea of business travel between Bgd and Niš would work by plane. Driving is about 3h and you leave when you want and return when you want.
DeleteIf you have four people in the auto the price per person is substantially reduced. Plus you have use of the auto in the city.
Flights between INI and BEG can only work as transfers for people from Niš flying elsewhere.
@last anon
DeleteBut not all people drive, and hiring car with the driver to go for a meeting/presentation/whatever to Nis/Leskovac/Vranje is quite expensive. Many business trips are just one person. But yes, mostly transfers INI-BGD.
Realistically, if you are involved in a business deal, presentation, meeting, and have a need to go to Niš from Bdg. Then, you either have a car or have access to a car. Either a company car, a friend, or rental.
DeleteTo conclude, we expect JP/OU to open flights to INI and we still have cars and good old Nis Express :)
DeleteGuys, why aren't you mentioning business travallers? There are huge companies in both cities.
DeleteFor me personally, BEG-INI will turn out a true success.
I think you're all forgetting the fact that Serbs love their cars. And truth be told, in a country with such poor public transport (in both Nis and Belgrade) the car is the only option for the business traveler.
DeleteSo, let's not fool ourselves. Business travel by plane between Nis and Belgrade may be reasonable in 2050.
But in the meantime, as emigration from Southern Serbia rises exponentially, there is definitely a market for companies like JU, JP, OS (not so sure about OUs frequencies) to send small aircraft to INI and collect pax to fly them to places like Oslo, Stockholm, Amsterdam, Paris, with more frequencies and choices than the currently operating LCCs do.
I didn't forget about cars, I mentioned it at 10:11, see above.
DeleteAlso, anon @8:31 mentioned role of business travelers.
Also, anon @7:39 mentioned role of OU, JP or OS.
Just playing with you buddy!
@ anon 11:15
DeleteAre you sure you are anon at 10:11? xD
Sorry bro, meant 8:56.
DeleteAnon 11:15, sorry, I don't understand what you're trying to say.
DeleteLive with it before you sleep....INI needs BEG just like the flower needs water.
DeleteINI is an airport with potential and needs more attention. It has been neglected during the last couple of years especially during the YM years when they used to fly to TGD.
Anyway, looking forward to the 600 thousand mark by 2020.
How does INI need BEG? If BEG didn't exist, INI wouldn't collapse.
DeleteYou sound a little confused and slightly frustrated.
INI can be a true BEG feeder generating even more traffic flow compared to other destinations such as, say, VCE or KBP. Do you get the point?
Deletetrue dat.
Delete"if you want people flying from Belgrade to the South to do business and return the same day, as well as for 'transfers'."
ReplyDeleteAwesome. Nis already took over Plovdiv and Debrecen. Now a pursuit to catch TZL. The long term goal is going to at least compete with Timisoara. It will be real hard, but if guys at Nis keep up with good work by 2020 nothing is impossible.
ReplyDeleteNote that worrysome Vinci BEG concession agreement clause to limiting Serbias regional airports can be relativized with PSO flights.
We still need to see what happens with that concession agreement and limiting other airports to grow. That would be really bad.
DeleteWhat do you mean by "relativized with PSO flights"?
True but PDV is not a good example as Bulgaria has SOF,VAR & BOJ + it is only 1h15m drive from SOF.
DeleteDEB recently added VKO to its network and has LH - true legacy.
TZL - yes, this is a good comparison but still remains a base and INI not.
The only true airport INI can be compared to is CRA or KSC.
DEB has LH while INI has LX, so ...
DeleteAlso, Debrecen has been 'operational' for much longer. Wizz Air was forced to fly from there after Malev went bust.
It doesn't matter, DEB is a base and serves LH something that INI doesn't have. Lets not compare apples with pears.
DeleteWhat's funny is that INI actually had more passengers than Debrecen in 2017.
DeleteINI: 331.582 passengers
DEB: 318 184 passengers
Debrecen will most likely handle around 350.000 passengers this year while INI is aiming for 400.000.
So in a way, INI is doing a fantastic job given that it's not anyone's base. I can only imagine how the airport's numbers would boom if someone did it.
And by the way, I think comparing DEB and INI makes absolute sense as both Serbia and Hungary are extremely similar.
True, and they are de facto the only 2 international airports serving the country - also makes sense.
DeleteWhat happen to 7 years old Morava Airport?.
ReplyDeleteJust hope. Or?
I was thinking of the same, I think the government is focused on BEG and INI only.
DeleteWhy wasn't INI included in the Stansted Ryanair Winter Timetable 2008_
ReplyDeleteOn the end of this decad, Airport Morava vill be with active air services. And active member in Airrports of serbia. Passion is crucial. 🇷🇸
ReplyDelete