Belgrade Airport is preparing for a busy winter season, which will see it handle more flights than ever before, following on from what is set to be a record summer. A number of carriers have already committed to increasing both frequencies and capacity to the Serbian capital when compared to last year. Air Serbia will headline the airport's winter operations with the addition of seven routes, which were launched this summer. The carrier will maintain two weekly flights to Barcelona, Cairo, Helsinki, Kiev, Krasnodar, Madrid and Rijeka. Furthermore, it is soon expected to file additional frequencies on some five routes within its network for the upcoming winter.
Among foreign carriers, Air France will maintain daily operations between Paris and Belgrade, which were launched this summer season. Israeli carrier Israir Airlines will extend its seasonal operations between Tel Aviv and Belgrade past late October until January 5 of next year. It will run two weekly rotations. Flydubai will boost operations from five weekly last winter to daily starting October 27. Aegean Airlines will introduce an extra weekly service to the Serbian capital for a total of four flights per week from Athens. Wizz Air will upgrade its seasonal service to Larnaca to year-round operations, while low cost carrier easyJet plans to boost its flights between Geneva and Belgrade to three weekly in November and four weekly from mid-December for the rest of the winter season until late March. The route is currently served twice per week.
On the other hand, Norwegian Air Shuttle, which last winter upgraded its seasonal service between Stockholm and Belgrade to year-round operations, has downgraded the route to summer only. The flights were maintained once per week during the 2018/2019 winter. However, it will continue to run a two weekly service from Oslo. The airline faced competition on its Stockholm route from both Air Serbia, which serves Arlanda Airport, and Wizz Air, which flies to Skavsta. Belgrade Airport expects to handle over six million passengers in 2019, its first full year under French operator VINCI. During the first half of the year, the airport welcomed 2.612.981 travellers through its doors, up 6%.
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Someone eilldo exact calculation, but that is about 30 weekly frequencies more than last year, not counting increase on those 5 JU's routes which were announced.
JU expansion was a blessing as it forced FR and W6 to become proactive, FR launched MLA while W6 reinforced their Malmo market.
I am sure Vinci and Terna will get Serbian subcontractors for various works but overall they were looking for firms with experience in large scale projects. So they went for the safe choice rather than take risks with a local firm.
Just my2cents
And BA wont be trying BEG before the Visa requirement for Serbian citizens is lifted by the UK or until the LHR third runway becomes operational.
Both events are very far into the future.
Same story with QR, sure Indians and Chinese help fill seats but at the same time so do those going to Australia, Africa...
That's why both of these added flights before non-stop flights are launched. Also, I don't think BEG is really able to handle more widebody flights as the airport is in desperate need of expansion.
It is for their massive intercontinental network out of LHR and the connectivity it would provide to our country.
Also the second runway should also start soon.
So they reduced their expansion by a lot and cut certain European destinations that were launched recently such us Basel, Cologne, London–City, Stuttgart. No new European routes are planned for the time being.
A good opportunity for FR.
Success of MAD and BCN for Air Serbia could be extended to LIS next year at least seasonally, it they sort out fleet issues and scheduling.
It would not be good all LCC's to become like FR or W6. Therefore Norwegian and easyJet should survive as they really provide the difference when it comes to LCC service.
They're flying three weekly.
They only canceled transatlantic flights scheduled to be operated by the 737MAX.
Those were overwhelmingly from Ireland and Scotland.
I know that MAD, BCN, KRR, HEL, NCE, ZAD have been a total success so far (I know it's early days and also not to say others didn't do well, just that these 6 exceeded all expectations) so I feel like ASL will be quite encouraged by that and perhaps add more destinations next summer. I just don't know with which fleet, they are completely stretched at the moment...
Maybe PMI or ZAZ? W6 already enjoys a huge ZAZ Romania traffic.