Ryanair to skip Montenegro in 2012

No Ryanair flights to Montenegro until 2013

Europe’s largest low cost airline, Ryanair, won’t be commencing flights to Montenegro before 2013. Originally, the airline was planned to inaugurate flights to Podgorica this winter season but negotiations between Ryanair and the Montenegrin government broke down after it requested for the no frills airline carry 100.000 passengers out of Podgorica in one year and a further 50.000 passengers during the low season, from October until May. Petar Ivanović, the head of the Agency for the Promotion of Foreign Investments in Montenegro, said recently that Ryanair won’t start flights to the country next year either because the government has missed its opportunity to attract the carrier. He outlined that Ryanair has already compiled a list of destinations it will launch in 2013 and neither Podgorica nor Tivat is on it.

Ryanair flights to Montenegro would not only provide inexpensive travel but also allow for passenger growth at Montenegro’s airports. In the first ten months of the year Podgorica Airport handled 528.577 passengers while rival Tivat welcomed 624.009 passengers. Tivat has seen significant passenger growth, already surpassing the 2010 end of year result when it handled 541.386 passengers.

Currently, no low cost airline operates flights to Montenegro, with the exception of the semi low cost Air Berlin which maintains seasonal summer flights from Nuremberg to Tivat. It is estimated that many passengers looking for inexpensive travel to and from Montenegro are turning to Dubrovnik in Croatia instead.