Charter airlines have been the biggest losers from the low-cost carrier boom in Europe.
Traffic on many summer-sun routes from London have halved since 2000.
Cranfield University professor Riga Doganis told the Future of Air Transport Conference: “Low-cost carriers have not so much created new traffic as directed traffic away from the charter airlines.”
He predicted no more than three major charter carriers will survive in Europe. However, Doganis also predicted the failure of most no-frills carriers. “The majority will go out of business,” he said. “There is too much capacity in too many markets.”
Doganis referred to a Civil Aviation Survey of No-Frills Carriers published this year that showed charter traffic from London to many popular summer destinations fell by 51% between 2000 and 2005.
The charter carriers have even suffered on longer routes such as the Canary Islands, Turkey, Cyprus and Crete, to which no-frills airlines have barely developed services.
The CAA showed an average 11% fall in charter passengers on such routes from London in the five years to 2005.