PREMIUM
airBaltic has maintained limited operations to the former Yugoslavia over the past decade, concentrating primarily on the Croatian coast with seasonal flights to Split, Dubrovnik and Rijeka. The airline also operated flights between Riga and Belgrade from 2009 to 2011 but suspended the service along with a number of other destinations due to financial problems and a fleet shortage at the time. However, the carrier has avoided serving any capital city airport in the former Yugoslavia since. In recent years, Ljubljana has seen solid demand for flights to the Baltic nations of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Coupled with indirect demand to Zagreb, Ljubljana Airport could benefit from nonstop flights if it were to lure a carrier before its Croatian counterpart.
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| Air Baltic operating markets as of July 2021 |
During 2019, the last normal year for commercial aviation, the three Baltic capital cities were amongst Ljubljana’s sixteen top unserved routes in Europe. That year, 4.886 passengers flew indirectly between Tallinn and the Slovenian capital, 4.573 between Riga and Ljubljana, as well as 4.255 travellers between Vilnius and Ljubljana. In total, 13.714 passengers flew between the Baltic capital cities and Ljubljana in 2019. This figure is prior to any market stimulation which would occur as a result of nonstop flights, as well as potential transfer options from Ljubljana via the Baltics to Northern Europe. During the same period, there were a total of 18.497 indirect passengers from the three countries to Zagreb, which also lacks nonstop flights.
Indirect passenger flow between Baltic capitals and Ljubljana in 2019
LOT Polish Airlines benefited the most from Ljubljana’s lack of connectivity to the Baltic states. In 2019, LOT’s second busiest destination for feeder traffic to and from the Slovenian capital was Tallinn, followed by Vilnius in fifth position. The airline handled 2.088 (42.7% of all indirect traffic) and 1.791 (42.1%) of connecting passengers respectively. Lufthansa came second for all three cities, in combination with Adria Airways, which ferried passengers to and from Frankfurt and Munich. Although numbers were significantly down in 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic, the Baltics and the Slovenian capital still saw some passenger flow, mostly from Vilnius, which in 2019 had the least traffic out of the three.
Indirect passenger flow between Baltic capitals and Ljubljana in 2020
