Ryanair subsidiary Lauda will open a base in Zadar during the 2020 summer season by initially stationing three Airbus A320 aircraft and launching a range of new routes. In total, the carrier will maintain flights to 31 cities from Zadar. These include some routes previously operated by Ryanair. The new services from Zadar include Aarhus, Beauvais, Bremen, Cork, Hamburg, Kaunas, Maastricht, Riga, Liverpool, Toulouse, Vienna and Wroclaw. The majority of the services will be introduced from early May. The three A320s were originally planned to be based in Palma, however, the airline said it wanted to strongly focus on the tourism sector in Croatia instead, noting that the country been a highly sought after holiday destination.
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Lauda’s CEO, Andreas Gruber, said "Croatia is one of the most popular destinations for summer holidays by the sea. Every year the country records further growth, but from many regions, the range of flights is quite thin and often expensive. We offer an unbeatable value for money on 31 routes to and from Zadar, enabling passengers to enjoy unforgettable but affordable beach holidays in Croatia. The local economy will also benefit greatly because together with our parent company Ryanair we will bring many thousands of travellers to Zadar. This not only safeguards jobs, but also creates many incriminating jobs in Croatia". A number of the destinations to be launched out of Zadar will be served by Lauda for the first time.
As previously reported, Lauda was initially interested in opening a base in the Croatian capital of Zagreb, but backed down following strong objections from Croatia Airlines. In addition to the new base, Zadar Airport is expected to see a number of airlines launch new routes to the city in 2020. These include Austrian Airlines from Vienna, Jet2 from London Stansted and Manchester, easyJet from Basel and Amsterdam. as well as SAS from Copenhagen. Furthermore, Lauda's parent company Ryanair will commence flights from Gdansk.
In order to facilitate the significant growth in traffic, Zadar Airport will initiate a seventy million euro expansion and overhaul of its facilities. It will become the latest airport in the country, following Zagreb, Dubrovnik and Split, to carry out major upgrades. They include the overhaul of the runway and its extension by 700 metres, as well as the expansion of the terminal building and apron. The Croatian government will assist with the financing. Zadar Airport's General Manager, Josip Klišmanić, previously noted that necessary project documentation will be obtained during 2019 in order for work on the project to commence as soon as possible. No firm timeframe has been given as to when construction work could be completed.
Bravo Zadar :)
ReplyDeleteYes very nice expansion.
DeleteSo this means Zadar will be conected with all major airports in Netherlands, Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Eindhoven and Maastricht
With so many new flights ZAD will reach 1,2 million pax next year.
ReplyDeleteCongratulations Zadar! This is fantastic news.
ReplyDelete+1!!
DeleteWill it be a seasonal base?
ReplyDeleteDon't think so, but many routes probably will.
DeleteIt will be a seasonal base.
DeleteIt will probably be seaonal, I guess. But I cant seem to find any source saying the base is seasonal or all routes will be seasonal only.
DeleteCan anyone find a source or maybe admin can request further information on this?
This is massive. Well done!
ReplyDeleteShame that Zagreb missed out on this because of Croatia Airlines!
ReplyDeleteSo true. Imagine all these destinations being added from Zagreb :(
DeleteSomething Eurowings should long have done. But EW is lost in finding itself...
DeleteRead the article that is linked inside this one. EW also wanted to open a base in Zagreb but were warned off by the government.
Delete@11.21 only difference would have been that many of these routes could have been year round from Zagreb.
DeleteFinally. Good job.
ReplyDeleteWow!!! This could be the biggest presence of a single foreign carrier in Croatia. This is equal to 500,000 new passengers in just one deal!
ReplyDeleteOh, wow, 31 destinations :O
ReplyDeleteThis could have been Zagreb :(
ReplyDeleteOr it could have been OU
DeleteMajor news. I wish them all the best.
ReplyDeleteLast night easyjet put on sale new ZAD routes to AMS and BSL. We didn't need to wait long for FR response.
ReplyDeleteconsidering the operational performance and incidents Laudamotion produces again and again I'm not really sure whether this will actually be an improvement for ZAD. There are probably not many airlines in Europe with that many delays and technical problems (once again today with OE-LOJ) given the fleet size.
ReplyDeleteHaving said that, there's a lot of exaggeration or call it hyperbole going on at the moment regarding OE, especially on german speaking news sites. I have a feeling LH Group or OS is lobbying against OE and partially W6 in the media.
DeleteYou noticed that too? Same feeling about LH and W6 against Air Serbia since 2013. But it's a feeling, nothing can be proven.
DeleteThe base might be staffed by former Adria pilots. :-) Previously Laudamotion offered them a job mostly from PMI base, but now with 3 A320s moved from PMI to ZAD also a job offer might change...
ReplyDeleteNice. Many new markets for the first time.
ReplyDeleteMy first thoughts on this were that since Laudamotion is a subsidiary of Ryanair, could it be that Ryanair may pull out and Laudamotion would take over. This way Ryanair still has a foot in the Zadar market.
ReplyDeletePartially that is the case. So far FR and Laude had total 22 ZAD routes. After this they have on sale 32 routes in total, so extra 10. As I can see 14 routes will be under Lauda brand, 4 routes under Buzz, and the rest 14 under Ryanair. It must be something with not getting 737max.
DeleteInteresting Wroclaw is being operated by Lauda and not Buzz.
DeleteAlso, weirdly, the route ZAD-VIE to their own home base will be operated by AL (Malta Air), not Lauda.
DeleteAs now stands, next summer there will be from ZAD 71 routes to 56 destinations. That is way too much for that poor so called terminal that looks more like a small LIDL store.
ReplyDeleteThankfully they plan to expand the terminal but next summer will not be a nice sight in Zadar.
DeleteThe good thing is that only 2 routes will have flights on Saturday.
Delete^ I presume Saturday is extremely busy at the airport?
DeleteActually 3 flights are operating on Saturday. Toulouse just added.
DeleteWill any of the routes be kept in winter?
ReplyDeleteI don't think so. Who travels to ZAD in winter?
DeleteAll of the routes seem to serve tourists. Who is going to fly between Kaunas and Zadar in winter on an A320?
DeleteIf you click on the links for the scheduled new routes it says its seasonal.
Delete@13.17 Vienna-Zadar could be kept at least.
DeleteWhole Dalmatia hibernates from 1.11. to 1.4.
Deletenot to mention that public transport switches to winter schedule in the first week of Sept (Zadar region) lol
DeleteNot sure - Paris/BVA or Greater Manchester Area/LPL and HAM and VIE could work on lower frequency in winter; bear in mind that also for ex. Stuttgart, Cologne, Munich are year round from/to Split.
DeleteNice. So most routes are 2 weekly.
ReplyDeleteNice to see some more exotic routes like Kaunas :D
ReplyDeleteNot in my wildest dreams would I have thought something like this would happen! Way to go Zadar, congratz!
ReplyDeleteHow many passengers could Zadar have next year with all of these new routes.
ReplyDeleteI think between 1.3-1.4 million.
DeleteI would say easily above 1M.
DeleteBut that is still insignificant considering that area from island of Pag down to Sibenik can accommodate 300.000 tourists per day.
So, it slowly moves from road tourists to air tourists.
WOW!
ReplyDeleteIf Split wasn't struggling with capacity, I think they would have opened a base there instead.
ReplyDeleteThat's questionable as I doubt Split would have given them the same terms as Zadar has.
DeleteStill it is no secret that Zadar has benefited from capacity issues at ZAG.
Delete** correction, wanted to write capacity issues at SPU.
DeleteBetter said poor management at SPU led all the growth to ZAD!
DeleteTruth is in between all of these statements. All of them are correct.
DeleteThe great things is that not only Lauda is adding flights to Zadar but so many other airlines too. Cudos to Zadar Airport management.
ReplyDeleteTrue. And it's nice to see a few legacies in there too
Delete"In addition to the new base, Zadar Airport is expected to see a number of airlines launch new routes to the city in 2020. These include Austrian Airlines from Vienna, Jet2 from London Stansted and Manchester, easyJet from Basel and Amsterdam. as well as SAS from Copenhagen. Furthermore, Lauda's parent company Ryanair will commence flights from Gdansk."
I wonder what the terms were. Will Lauda get some benefits or incentives?
ReplyDeleteI am sure FR/OE/AL would not fly to ZAD and even have a base there, if they didn't get noticable amounts of marketing support or however they call it in this case.
DeleteShame SPU doesn't want to lower fees by a single cent.
Are all of these routes unserved from Zadar?
ReplyDeleteVienna will be served by Lauda and Austrian. The rest are unserved.
DeleteGreat. Thank you for the quick response.
Deleteits 10 new routes. the rest is takeover from Ryanair (Lauda is producing much cheaper)
Delete12 are new
DeleteWell done to Zadar and Lauda/Ryan. But how pathetic of Croatia Airlines. They will have a subtotal of 3 routes next summer to Zadar. Two of them are seasonal subsidised PSO routes. Congratulations! It must be TOO EARLY to respond.
ReplyDeletecome on where do you want OU to respomd here. to Kaunas?
DeleteIt could have based a plane and launched flights to perspective leisure markets. Kaunas is obviously one of them. Now it's too late. There is no point.
Delete@Anon 13h38: You mean like OU does not know any airport in Vienna, Paris, Germany or England?
Delete(Obviously, Kaunas would be far fetched for OU.)
Surprised air baltic didn't consider launch Riga. Good to see Lauda instead.
ReplyDeleteWill they be hiring Croatian crew?
ReplyDeleteYES!
DeleteI don't understand what was the point of FR closing its Zadar base last year only for it to open a Lauda base next year.
ReplyDeletecheap labor. not much makes sense with Ryanair lately (Malta Air, Buzz, Laudamotion ..)
DeleteWhat is the price ZAD paid to Lauda for establishing base there?
ReplyDeleteThe total amount of money they pay now for 32 routes is almost the same that they paid for 13 routes few years ago. Which tells you that Ryanair is making nice money over the summer.
DeleteThe average FR one-way ticket price form/to ZAD in June-Sept is above 115 EUR.
If I were ZAD I wouldn't pay a dime for summer-only operation.
DeleteSadly it doesn't seem to work that way.
ZAD doesn't care. It's paid from county tourist taxes budget. Overall in 2019 it comes down to €1.3 per air tourist per night, so it's peanuts. it will be even less next year.
DeleteBy *if I were ZAD - I meant if I were whoever is paying.
DeleteAnd I wouldn't try and spin the angle like 'oh, it's nothing'. Ryanair is making loads of money in summer, full stop. They don't deserve a penny on top for a deal like this. Just like they committed to a full year base the first time and then sneaked out of it with no penalties. To me the whole setup's criminal.
But hey, I'm happy there's some traffic. Hopefully the markets get developed and in the end there's no need to grease O'Leary.
Usually such projects (commercially not feasible ones) are financed not only by city or county tourist board, but also by the country tourist board, as they have the largest budget. Whenever you see weird projects/announcements such as this one, or easyjet adding several routes to Pula or winter flights to Rijeka etc., remember that these are financed at country level. Currently HTZ's focus (read a spreading money) is on winter flights in DBV and SPU and summer (including shoulders) operations in ZAD, PUY and RJK. Despite their generous budget, no one is interested in OSI.
DeleteSo, what is finally the amount ZAD pays to Lauda?
DeleteThey could keep Vienna and Beauvais in winter in my opinion.
ReplyDeleteAt least these two, plus HAM and maybe LPL as written above.
DeleteThanks ex-Yu for publishing the schedules and being quick with this news. Still to be reported anywhere in Croatia :D
ReplyDelete+1
DeleteIt would have been reported in Croatia instantly if someone announced they were closing routes but since it's positive...
DeleteThere was a big conference in Zadar today in which all media were present. Except for an aviation portal, this news is fresh tomorrow as well ;) Or you heard the big news from the car industry today?
DeleteVery good news for the local economy and tourism sector.
ReplyDelete+1
DeleteI wonder which route will be most popular
ReplyDeleteBravo Hrvatska!
ReplyDeleteBravo for airports on the coast, not bravo for Zag!
DeleteWell its bravo for the people in Zagreb as well since ZAD is easy accessible from Zagreb. So it is Bravo Hrvatska indeed.
DeleteWhat? Let's shut down ZAG airport then as people in Zagreb can easily access Zadar according to you.
DeleteZAD deserves credit, ZAG does not.
Croatia routes will explode again on the overview on this blog once they are added in the new routes announcement section on the right hand side.
ReplyDeleteMaster plan of traffic in Croatia would be: a large, country main airport to be built on place of existing ZAD + a high speed rail network reaching Dubrovnik, Pula, Rovinj, Čakovec, Odjek and Vukovar. Zagreb Airport might be turned into a secondary airport .ZAD would handle 10-15m people it's on ideal position and airlines are getting that
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely wrong. 95% of passengers to/from ZAD are tourists.
DeletePeople from Dalmatia travel abroad so rarely.
Actually is not very rare.When I travelled to Prague half of the plane was filled with Croatian people
DeleteI think this is the first route from Kaunas to Croatia :D
ReplyDeleteThe Croatia growth is really fantastic, even ZAG is growing not having received so many new routes.
ReplyDeleteZAD has a rich history with FR ever since it opened its base a couple of years ago.
Croatia's tourism is maturing and even attracting huge players such as AA.
It is now up to ZAD to try long-haul and talk with DY on establishing routes to JFK, LAX, SFO, YYZ and so on.
BRAVO Hrvatska!
Ajme
DeleteJust do it and they will come.
ReplyDelete