Airline Network Development in Europe and its Implications for Airport Planning

By: Guillaume Burghouwt

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Synopsis: The ongoing deregulation and liberalization of worldwide air transport markets confronts airport planners with an increasingly problematic context. On the one hand, the capital intensive, large-scale and complex airport investments need a detailed, long/medium-term planning of airport infrastructure. Such planning requires at least predictable traffic volumes (and traffic composition) within the planning horizon. On the other hand, airline route networks are increasingly dynamic structures that frequently show discontinuous changes. As a consequence, the much more volatile airport traffic restricts the value of detailed traffic forecasts. Volatility of airport traffic and its composition requires flexibility of airport strategies and planning processes. The book explores this dilemma through a detailed study of airline network development, airport connectivity and airport planning in the deregulated EU air transport market. The questions the book seeks to answer are: Â· how have airlines responded to the regime changes in EU aviation with respect to the configuration of their route networks? Â· what has been the impact of the reconfiguration of airline network configurations for the connectivity of EU airports? Â· how can airport planners and airport authorities deal with the increasingly uncertain airline network behaviour in Europe?