The former Yugoslavia’s 21 commercial airports with scheduled passenger traffic handled a combined total of 31.389.457 travellers during the first three quarters of the year (January - September). Croatia was the fastest-growing market, adding 742.007 passengers over the nine-month period, while Pristina was the region’s fastest-growing airport, with an additional 440.926 passengers year-over-year. Belgrade remained the former Yugoslavia’s busiest airport, managing to overturn a decline in traffic at the start of the year to add 376.827 travellers during the first three quarters. The only two airports that handled fewer customers than in 2024 so far are Osijek and Brač, although Podgorica just managed to outperform its 2024 results.
Among the smaller airports in the region, Tuzla has begun to stage a recovery, supported by new services from Wizz Air, Pegasus Airlines and AJet. Its growth is expected to significantly accelerate towards the end of the year, with Wizz Air set to reopen its base in the city this December after more than two years. Banja Luka Airport also added over 70.000 passengers, primarily driven by Wizz Air’s expansion, and to a lesser extent Ryanair. Jointly, Bosnia and Herzegovina’s four airports added a combined total of 494.303 passengers.
Well now we know why Podgorica gave into Wizz Air.
ReplyDeleteHow come there is practically no growth? No one cancelled flights compared to last year.
DeleteTourism season bombed in Montenegro this year.
DeleteFR had fewer flights and Air Montenegro didn't operate many charters.
DeleteGood results overall
ReplyDeleteWould have expected DBV to have much bigger growth with Ryanair around, especially with their year round flights.
ReplyDeleteQ4 is still ongoing, this is when DBV can see the benefit of new year-round flights
Delete^ Yes I agree. But what happened to Q1 or summer because with 4% growth, one or the other didn't deliver
DeleteThere is a reason DBV is giving discounts and subsidies in winter. Seats will be there but will passengers show up?
DeleteAlso in summer there is a limit to how many passengers can actually visit DU. It depends on pricing of hotels and how many rooms are actually offered.
Dubrovnik needs to keep building hotels in order for their numbers to keep growing.
I don't think that Dubrovnik need more hotels. There are really a lot of them. I wouldn't count Q1 because this year Dubrovnik just started with concrete initiatives for the season expansion. The results we should see in Q4.
Delete@Anonymous09:15
DeleteThere are 5 new large hotels under construction, all 5* Hotels, and several 4* hotels. Not sure you can add more hotels if visitors don't show up.
Lovely pic. Which airport is that?
ReplyDeleteSplit
DeleteTerminal looks fantastic. It's just missing some nice glass air bridges.
DeleteThey decided against air bridges to save space so more planes can park.
DeleteBalkan logic.
DeleteNo, it is just logic. More parking spots means more aircraft can be accommodated, so more flights can be handled, so more passengers can come!
DeleteWhich is actually exactly non-Balkan logic. Balkan logic wouldn't care about business results. The most important thing would be to look nice so they can show off
Delete@10:33
DeleteExactly!
Meanwhile Greece has over 35 airports I think and only ATH has jet bridges.
Malta has no bridges, very small terminal building for an airport of BEG's traffic size yet operations are smooth.
Delete@11:13 although Malta airport can be very crowded at times. But i agree it seems to be a super efficient operation given its limitation on size.
DeleteTIA has over 10 million pax per year and they don't have jet bridges, yet most of the times the airport is running smoothly.
Deletedefo looks better with jet bridges
DeleteWell done PRN!
ReplyDeleteImpressive stuff
DeleteI think this is the first time they are ahead of Split in September, cumulatively.
Delete^ yep
DeleteZagreb is cooked
DeletePRN achievement is even more impressive if you take into account the massive growth TIA has.
DeleteI would expect that it would put pressure on PRN demand but it didn't.
Visa free travel as a novelty is still having an impact. Also, I don't think TIA is even close to being a competitor to PRN as SKP is.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteIf same growth rate continues, PRN will overtake ZAG in 2026.
Delete@14:00
DeleteIt won't. PRN will stagnate as of next year if it doesnt begin adding new routes.
would like to see September nrs for all
DeleteBelgrade will be just under 8 million this year?
ReplyDeleteIt had 8.4 million last year but you expect it to have less with growth?
DeleteCan we reach 9 million this year?
DeleteI don't think so. More likely 8.8-8.9
DeleteBravo Hrvatska!
ReplyDeleteIt is wild that PRN added more pax so far this year than both BEG and ZAG!
ReplyDeleteWith visa liberalisation and most of Kosovo's population living abroad at this point, it's really no surprise.
DeleteWhat a load of bs
Delete@ An.12.24
DeletePRN added more pax this year than BEG and ZAG combined. Those are facts and numbers. How can facts and numbers be "load of BS"?
More than BEG and ZAG combined? How about you use a calculator and do the maths again
Delete"Those are facts"
DeleteOk, it is not combined, but it is more than BEG and more than ZAG, each. So, it's still not "load of bs"
DeleteCroatia makes 38% of all passanger traffic in the region and by the end of the year it will be 40%.
ReplyDeleteThis means that every 4th passenger traveled to/from Croatia.
No offense it just shows the small importance of other countries, except Serbia which makes 22% of all passangers.
Yes and over 85% of Croatian traffic are tourists, not the local population.
DeletePr you can say how
DeleteEasy. Compare winter and summer traffic and you will get almost accurate results
Delete@11:39 Well if you want to look at it another way, the whole total for EX-YU is about half the number of passengers who pass through Heathrow, so we could say the whole region is rather 'unimportant' , but that wouldn't be a far comparison now would it?
DeleteI agree whole our region is relatively unimportant, with underdeveloped air traffic. But it's the fact Croatia is the biggest market in ex-yu, and with biggest potential, too. It's always been the case, including Yugo times. Now imagine Croatia had flag carrier doing similar job as JU. But no, we shall still have "clever" people here, and "professionals" praising single type fleet and 13 percent market share. And with strong OU, results from today's article could be much much higher, with good deal of Balkan transfer traffic being re-directed through OU, and overall traffic leveled up from 38 to 45-50 percent. And some money earned doing so, of course. But unfortunately, it's easier to get fat paycheck doing nothing, obey orders and sing Danke Deutschland
DeleteSingle type is perfect for Croatian market. Only problem is, it will be consisted of only 15 planes and not 35 or more.
DeleteCroatian market consists of 8 domestic airports, some of them more than 1.000 km away from which other. For better domestic connectivity, especially with possible meaningful PSO, smaller type is needed. The same type could be used for thinner regional routes. Single type in question is OK only for Euro Mediterranean services and potential feed to its ZAG hub. To be competitive, larger capacity aircraft is required for the most frequent European routes, especially for slot constrained airports as for example AMS, and for seasonal coastal services which are almost completely neglected and totally uncompetitive. Finally, long haul type is needed for over 2 million passengers visiting Croatia yearly from distant markets, ethnic and transfer traffic and foreign workers. Therefore, single type 120-150 seater for short and medium range is anything but perfect. In fact it's totally opposite. The only thing I agree about is roughly 35 units total needed.
DeleteThat type of fleet is not efficient at all. Croatia Airlines needs far larger single type fleet.
DeleteOr you can say that top 3 out of 21 have 44% of traffic. So you can spin these how ever you want
ReplyDeletebit pointless when the 4th is only 60k behind
DeleteZadar at only %2 also bit unexpected
ReplyDeleteIn September their numbers were down on Sep 24.
DeleteCroatia is fastest-growing market in terms of added passengers. In terms of percentage growth year-over-year, Bosnia had the higher relative growth.
ReplyDeleteYes but percentage growth is pretty irrelevant. The smaller the base number the bigger the percentage growth is if you have an increase.
DeleteBoth total number of passengers added and relative growth in percentage points have relevance. Saying that "percentage growth is pretty irrelevant" could be interpreted by ZAG growth of 9.8% being "pretty irrelevant" compared to BEG growth of 5.9%, as BEG actually added more passengers than ZAG. That would be unfair to say, so relative growth is also important. Bosnia had significant double-digit percentage growth at all airports, which deserves recognition as having highest relative growth of all countries in Ex Yu region.
DeleteLol
Delete:D:D
DeleteBIH, KOS and MKD have highest change %
DeleteMontenegro
DeleteNow to boost INI
ReplyDeleteI don't understand how Croatia is the fastest growing market and yet Croatia Airlines is doing worse than ever.
ReplyDelete