The Slovenian Ministry of Economic Development and Technology has said it turned down several proposals from airlines to open a base in Ljubljana as none would have sufficiently improved the country’s connectivity. In a statement to EX-YU Aviation News, it said, “The Ministry of Economic Development and Technology had several meetings and communications with various airlines or air transport suppliers. The fact was that the majority of the proposals were relatively short-term oriented, mostly to cover the needs of Slovenia’s Presidency of the Council of the European Union. On the other hand, there was actually no appropriate proposal which would have enabled passengers travelling from or to Slovenia to benefit from high quality service, based on the proposed destinations, the timing and flight schedules, as well as the opportunities for connecting onto flights at Europe’s most important hubs”.
Based on previous reports, the Ministry held talks with the Lufthansa-owned Air Dolomiti, low cost carrier Wizz Air, Slovenian cargo airline Solinair and the French Valljet, while a carrier from the Middle East also expressed interest in establishing a new Slovenian operation. The Ministry also conducted discussions with Croatia Airlines, Air Serbia, LOT Polish Airlines and former Etihad Airways President and CEO turned consultant James Hogan. Air Dolomiti noted, “In the past we had contacts to see if cooperation was possible. Air Dolomiti is always seeking new partners and is open to assessing new possibilities. However, we made no concrete plans nor signed any agreements. We had a meeting to see and assess opportunities for both parties”.
The Ministry noted it has not received any new proposals since Slovenia’s Presidency of the Council of the EU concluded at the end of December 2021. “The proposals were mostly provided before and during the period of the Presidency. Following its completion, we have not received any additional proposals. We are planning to renew the subsidy program for foreign airlines operating at Ljubljana Airport, and to support the continuity of flight operations in 2022 to the amount of two million euros”, the Ministry of Economic Development and Technology concluded. Its head, Zdravko Počivalšek, recently said the government was still looking into ways to fill the void left by the collapse of Adria Airways in September 2019. “If we want to have better air connectivity in Slovenia, we will have to do something in this sector and find a way forward to enable progress, in cooperation with a private stakeholder. Currently, we do not have a national carrier, and air traffic is severely affected by the pandemic”, Mr Počivalšek said.
Basically we a condemned to this status quo :(
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, we will be stuck with this until everyone starts using neighboring airports.
Delete90% are already using ZAG, TRS, VCE, VIE, RJK, PUY.. it will be just a few years until it will be 100%
DeleteSad truth unfortunately.
DeleteI fail to see how subsidies to airlines that already flew to Slovenia helped LJU.
ReplyDeleteThey gave like 80% of that money to LH cartel, which is also one of the owners of incompetent Fraport. But for other airlines.. it did not help. Even more, they rejected Easyjet which was the biggest airline at LJU. They would fly 4 routes and carry like 300k passengers in 2020 if there was no corona. Now they barely fly to LJU. Seems like they want to get rid of competition.
DeleteThey even gave money to Swiss which did not meet the tender conditions as they did not fly to Ljubljana during the period that the subsidies was supposed to compensate.
DeleteThis makes me angry. So all of these were interested in helping Slovenia get more flights and the government just rejected them
ReplyDeleteShh... They must keep feeding mutti lufti and try to get rid of competition. Bravo Fraport! Bravo Slovenia!
DeleteWe don't really know what their terms and conditions were. Perhaps it genuinely made no sense to support them.
Delete^You seriously think this situation is better? I'm certain that was ever was offered was better than the current situation.
DeleteAir Dolomiti was outrageously expensive. The offers of OU and JU were acceptable and fair (shared risk), but unfortunately politically not attractive. "It would be politically inapropriate and unacceptable" were those WORDS describing why not OU or JU. Yeah, thats a reality of some guys playing with our country.
DeleteWow. Do you know what OU or JU offered?
DeleteAir Dolomiti wanted a sum which practically covers 100% capacity on the routes discussed. OU offered a shared risk deal - the sum would cover a certain % of the seats. With JU the situation is more ridiculous. By my knowledge, they werent even invited to talks, even if their (informal) offer was probably the cheapest. But the whole process had no focus. Things were moving at EXTREMELY slow peace. The ministries involved (ministry of Infrastructure and the ministry of Economic Development and Technology) had different "visions" if political interests can be called a vision. The main problem was, they were only looking for a solution for the period of the presidency.
DeleteThank you. Really disappointing to hear this.
DeleteAt least it's good to know someone was interested in Ljubljana.
ReplyDeleteKey here is past tense. WAS
DeleteJust keep rejecting... In the end the offers will stop.
ReplyDeleteThere are no offers left.
DeleteThey already have
Delete"The Ministry noted it has not received any new proposals since Slovenia’s Presidency of the Council of the EU concluded at the end of December 2021."
Well Ministry must be happy. No longer have to worry about formally responding to any proposals.
DeletePerhaps they should have been thinking about Adria's replacement months before it went bankrupt as everyone knew it would go bankrupt.
ReplyDeleteYey, or they could just keep adria as they had everything, traiing, planes, permissions,history, trust from other airlines (we should not forget that many airlines including croatia airlones, adria was there to help them at their start!) ... They just needed money and a better owner.
DeleteEveryone knew they were going bankrupt? A lot of people here were saying it's all media nonsense until the last day, including JP employees.
DeleteIn my opinion this were their last chance. None of those airlines will come back again with an offer after being rejected.
ReplyDeleteOf course they won't come back. Especially since these airlines took their own initiative to draw up a proposal. The government never asked anyone for it.
DeleteI can confirm what anon@10:08 is saying. The GOV has never made any inquires. Has not done any kind of consultations with the experts. One lady sitting in the office of minister has done decisions. A4 shit of paper. All you need to know about the commercial aviation in Slovenia. It was ridiculous.
DeleteThe more time passes the less of a possibility to find a solution.
ReplyDeleteStill waiting for the market to sort itself out like they promised?
ReplyDeleteHope some sort of a solution can be found.
ReplyDeleteIt can but government turned down all of them.
DeleteIt can be found when competent govt comes and Fraport leaves LJU. But that will never happen.
DeleteThe only solution is to create new airline. The other solution of the market taking care of itself did not work out.
DeleteSo Air Dolomiti was the "regional airline" LJU airport said it was in talks with months ago. So Air Dolomiti was Lufthansa's solution for Slovenian market. My guess is they would have replaced LH group on routes to LH hubs.
ReplyDeleteAir Dolomiti and Wizz are the ones that stand out for me here. Air Dolomiti probably would not be the best option. They would just fly to Lufthansa hubs. Wizz Air on the other hand could have introduced many routes and if successful would have based several planes in LJU.
ReplyDeleteWizzair with its capacity? hahhaha yeah sure. 7xA321.
DeleteThe whole aftermath of Adria going bankrupt was handled extremely badly. This is just another example of it.
ReplyDelete100+
DeleteWhy doesn't Slovenia launch tender for PSO routes? That way they could ensure connectivity.
ReplyDeleteBecause they do not want to improve connectivity.
DeleteBecause they are not interested. It has been proposed several times. The legal issue could be that PSO are mostly, but not exclusively, given for domestic flights. There are just a few international PSO. But they do not even TRY to submit the question (pre-aproval proces) to the EC. Nothing. Zero. Ministry of infrastructure is totally incompetent.
DeleteSo much talk, so little action.
ReplyDeleteWhat action do you expect when the ministry just said they rejected everyone.
DeleteThe government does not seem to care.
ReplyDeleteIn a year's time the government will also be talking about receiving offers but none were right for them.
ReplyDeleteThe government really does not care. Although I get the feeling most Slovenians don't either. I get that opinion here is different because we are aviation enthusiast but I don't think that on the ground many Slovenes care.
DeleteIn my observation, there is no airport in Europe that is developing so poorly.
ReplyDeleteLook at the successes of SJJ, PRN, TIA, SOF, OTP, BEG, ZAG.
Before, Bosnians, Macedonians, Albanians moved to Ljubljana for Europe, and now Slovenes go to Zagreb or Trieste.
I can't understand how Fraport manages the Greek and Bulgarian airports wonderfully and Ljubljana is at the bottom in Europe ?!
ReplyDeleteWell, the issues on the Slovenian market are probably not just down to Fraport.
DeleteAll of those airports have much more potential and have much less competition than LJU.
DeleteIf you were going to visit Bulgarian coast, what's the alternative to VAR or BOJ? Fly to SOF or OTP and spend another 4/5 hours on the road?
Greece has enormous potential, and most of Fraport's airports are either on the islands or they operate two in vicinity (SKG/KVA), so no problem with competition.
Time to face the truth that LJU is just a bit larger village on the European scale, sorrounded by plenty of large airports, which eat into its market.
Two Air Dolomiti E190 in LJU
ReplyDelete+
FRA daily
VIE daily
MUC daily
+Tirana,Skopje,Sarajevo,Prishtina, Zurich,Brussels, Copenhagen,London and greek destinations.
Perfect!..but never!
Why not make the offers public?
ReplyDeleteSomehow I doubt Wizz Air would be happy for the government to outline their commercial conditions. The government would get sued.
DeleteI'm surprised Trade Air is not interested in doing more in Slovenia other than charters.
ReplyDeleteThey are smart and don't want to loose money. They don't do much more than PSOs in Croatia either.
Delete+1
DeleteOne A320 with MUC,FRA,VIE,CPH,TLV,ZRH,LGW,AMS, SUS,BER;)))
When Windrose will start LJU😂😂😂😂😂
DeleteTrade Air is a charter airline. This is perfect for them. Adria's bankruptcy turned out great for them. Before that no one in Slovenia had ever even heard of Trade Air.
DeleteYes, and trade air, doesn't have the background for let say code shares and ticket sales, and ticket sales is one of the hardest things to made if you want to work properly
DeleteIf it were not for covid people would have a greater choice in terms of airlines and more competitive pricing now that Adria is gone.
ReplyDeleteThe situation on the Slovenian market is poor. For example, despite constant Fraport assurances how Iberia would extend its operations to Slovenia, Iberia has scheduled just a month worth of flights for next summer with no increase compared to last year.
ReplyDeleteAnd not only Iberia. Pretty much everything.
DeleteThe situation is dire and no matter what you think of Adria it definitely would have been better with them.
DeleteBA is also not increasing LJU despite airport assurances they would.
DeleteLet's hope the airlines will reconsider as Covid situation stabilizes.
DeleteSlovenia has been too passive since the demise of Adria.Other airports in the region had taken a serious stance on improving their connections. Look at TIA. Wizz Air just announced they will base another 2 planes there - total of 8!
ReplyDelete+100. Remember we are now competing and comparable to Sinop Airport in Turkey.
DeleteAnd with Tuzla, Banja Luka and Niš. LOL!!
DeleteA new national airline is required
ReplyDeleteThings could change quickly if new national airline is set up.
DeleteThe never ending story
DeleteThey really should have just kept Adria, kicked out 4K and found a partner.
ReplyDeleteAgree. The amount of lost revenue and profits from having such poor connectivity is less than financing the national airline.
DeleteSomebody would need to cover those tens of millions of EUR of debts that Adria has managed to amass first.
DeleteThose 100 millions or even less is peanuts in aviations, beside petrol has so expensive fuel that most of that miney came to the country during past years so.
DeleteSuch a sad story
ReplyDeleteSo Wizz Air did want a base in LJU. Obviously didn't get the right conditions.
ReplyDeleteWizz does not have appropriate aircraft for LJU.
DeleteWhat are you saying? Only cessnas can be successful in Ljubljana?
DeleteIf you aks majority here, yes. An they believe thay will have A380 to ZAG.
DeleteTheir A320/A320neos would suit LJU, A321/A321Neos are too big.
Deleteto fly where? to VIE with a320? to FRA? to ZUR? to MUC? 2x /day? yeah right
DeleteWho said they would fly these routes?
DeleteIs there still a chance that Slovenia might be interested in setting up a national airline? Or are we too far past that point?
ReplyDeleteIf Alenka Bratusek wins the elections, she promised a new airline :D
DeleteYet she is the one that sold it to crooks.
DeleteI don't understand the government's statement how most airlines offered to help out just during Slovenia's EU presidency. I mean what? They offered to base planes in LJU for 6 months and leave? Something does not add up and in my opinion it is probably the ministry spinning just so they can give a reason why they rejected everyone.
ReplyDeleteTotaly agree, wizz wasn't there because of elections, you know I don't belive that many eu staff would travel with them when you can come at anytime with bussines jet so, I agree with you.
Delete"If we want to have better air connectivity in Slovenia, we will have to do something in this sector" then do something for God's sake. I've been hearing this for more than two years and nothing has been done. Only words, words, words and zero action.
ReplyDeleteAt the end of the day. He doesn't care. He is also responsible for Adria's death.
Deleteit has become painfuly obvious, that Slovenia is too small to rely only on airliners to provide connectivity for them. It needs exactly what Adria was, but stremalined, with right people at right places, in cooperation with Tourist Board and with help from state, as fleet wich would suit it can't be profitable. If goal of the state would be to ensure connections, then they should embrace the fact, that there is a big chance it can't be profitable at the same time. But it can hold the costs on short leash to achieve net 0. There were just too many leechers and people who stole millions of € from Adria, and were never punished, money has never been retreated and same people responsible for its demise are still working in the industry. Connectivity for Slovenia means combination of A220/CRJ900/EMB195 plus AT75 fleet and cleaver plan where to fly, combined with tight cooperation with Tourist Board of Slovenia. By this enabling people from Slovenia to reach some hubs and destinations, and at the same time bring tourists to Slovenia. But govt selling Adria was too shortsited and basicaly neoliberal, and the current govt just too idiotic to understand anything beyond short time political gains. Time for creating Adria 2.0 has passed long time ago. Relying to outside partner to do the job of small regional airliner satisfying both business and political goals (yes, airliner connections are usualy at least partially covered by political interests - which countries and which cities to connect) is plain utopia.
ReplyDeleteAlso, by each day passing, less chance of summoning a team which is needed for such operation (flight crews, maintenence, operations, handlers....). And don't forget, almost half of Adria's passengers were people from Balkans connecting European destinations via Ljubljana. This market has been taken over. In short, amateurs which are running the country now are in no position and lack capabilites (professional, mental and if you want, political) to restart national airline. Again, this is the only way Slovenia can enhance its connectivity. Just look at bloody schedule for summer...the number of airlines serving LJU is less than 10! I still remember early 90', when situation was simillar, and it didn't get better for most part of the 90'.
All said. I would just add that "flying is a luxury" mentality of the general population does not help.
DeleteWell, with Adria charging 400eur+ to fly anywhere, flying from LJU actually was a luxury...
DeleteSo your expert advice is that the new national airline should have 4 types: A220/CRJ900/EMB195/AT75 fleet?
DeleteAnon above: well, I thought people engaged in aviation are smart enough, to recognise some concepts and that it would not be neccessary to hand draw them everything. No, of course I don't propose this mix of fleet, you silly sod, A220/CRJ900/EMB195 belong to same group, they are similar in seat numbers. One of them combined with AT75 would be a proper mix. A320/B738 type - no longer viable in Slovenia. No vawes, no transfer passengers and plenty of charters in the summer.
Delete@Anon above you...you must be member of the ruling party, they use such kind of logic - take something what is partially true, and repeat it ad nauseum. You are saying that lowest ticket price was 400+ for any destination. Well, I don't know about you, but I flew quite a lot with them, and the only outrageus price they had was BRU.
To @anon 00:36: Please let me know how much is price now from LJU to BRU (departing in the morning) and coming back to LJU in the evening? I would be happy with 400+ eur just to have that option.
DeleteDon't forget that you could get to BRU even below 200€, but of course you can't expect to fly for that money and be back in same day (or day after).
to Anon 09:43, Well, you have to get a bit creative. I will focus on Ryanair. You have 2x daily flights from CRL to Treviso (morning and evening flights), with the prices that start at 15eur... Then you have Zagreb flights with every second day of the week, with prices around 20eur, and then you also have Trieste with 2x weekly flight for about the same price. You just need to be a bit flexible, have a car and drive 1-2,5h away from Ljubljana and that is it.
DeleteMajority of companies/institutions will not adjust meetings according to your schedule. And majority of businessman/politicians will not travel to destination 1 day earlier and leave one day later because of lack of connectivity. They simply won't go to every meeting and that's direct hit to Slovenian economy.
DeleteThis statement from the Ministry makes me so angry.
ReplyDelete"On the other hand, there was actually no appropriate proposal which would have enabled passengers travelling from or to Slovenia to benefit from high quality service, based on the proposed destinations, the timing and flight schedules, as well as the opportunities for connecting onto flights at Europe’s most important hubs”.
I have no words
Maybe we can look at the connectivity of Ljubljana also from another perspective, namely the number of direct trains linking Ljubljana with places outside Slovenia.
ReplyDeleteZagreb (HR) 4 per day; Rijeka (HR) 2 per day; München (DE) 2 per day, one of them continue to Frankfurt; Vienna (AT) 2 per day (one staring only in Celje), Zurich (CH) 1 per day, Budapest (HU) 1 per day, Trieste (IT) 2 per day, one of them continuing to Udine.
And, very few of those trains start in Ljubljana. Ljubljana is just a stop on route between HR in one side and destination in DE and CH on the other. Similar with Trieste and Vienna, its about route Vienna to Trieste and back.
Different structure of passengers, slovenian horrible rail infrastructure, no medium to long destination etc. The number of direct trains does not explain the problem.
DeleteBasically we are screwed and no one in government plans to do anything about this.
ReplyDeletePretty much
DeletePeople responsable for aviation in the GOV have absolutely no clue about the commercial aviation. Most are lost in time and space and with no political support. Nothing good waits for us.
Delete