European air passenger traffic recovered to within 5% of 2019 levels last year and should increase by more than 7% on 2023 this year, airports association ACI Europe has forecast.
However, ACI Europe director general Olivier Jankovec warned leisure travel demand is “unlikely to defy” continuing economic pressures in the year ahead.
Air passenger numbers in Europe hit 2.3 billion last year, just under 95% of the 2019 total and 19% up on 2022, according to the association.
International traffic grew by 21% and Heathrow returned to its position as Europe’s busiest airport, handling more than 79 million passengers with traffic up 28.5% year on year.
But ACI Europe noted that while some airports saw record passenger numbers, volumes at more than half lagged pre-pandemic numbers, suggesting the market was shaped “by a mix of structural changes, demand resilience and severe geopolitical tensions”.
Jankovec hailed “robust growth” and “an impressive result considering the prevailing inflationary pressures and higher air fares, as well as heightened geopolitical tensions”.
He suggested: “It does speak volumes about the value and importance of air connectivity.” But he noted “unprecedented variations in traffic performance compared to pre-pandemic levels”.
Airports in Portugal and Greece saw 12% more passenger traffic than in 2019, but traffic in Finland remained 30% down on 2019, Germany 22% down and Sweden 21% down.
Traffic in Spain was 3% up on 2019 and Turkey 2.5% up, with Italy just 2% down, France 5% down, and the UK 6% down.
Jankovec said: “Geopolitical conflicts have been a significant contributor to this multi-speed recovery – predominantly affecting airports in Ukraine, Israel, Finland as well as in other Eastern European countries.
“But Covid-19 induced structural changes in the aviation market are also having a major impact.
“These structural changes include the prominence of leisure, and VFR [visiting friends and relatives] demand, utra low-cost carriers selectively expanding and full-service carriers retrenching on their hubs and driving consolidation.”
He argued these changes resulted in “increased competitive pressures for airports”.
Jankovec suggested: “Looking ahead, we’re likely to see these performance gaps narrowing but not closing. Geopolitical tensions are part of our new reality, and so are structural changes in the market.
“The big question marks will be about supply pressures and leisure demand resilience – with the latter unlikely to keep defying macroeconomics but becoming increasingly tied to them.”
He warned: “We also need to keep a close eye on operational issues, especially border control with the planned start of the Schengen [Area] Entry-Exit System next autumn, for which many outstanding issues still need to be resolved.”