Pristina Airport became the second busiest in the former Yugoslavia in 2020 overtaking Zagreb, Split and Dubrovnik. During the January - November period it handled 974.212 passengers, a decrease of some 58% on the year before, which is well below the European average. Pristina Airport itself was closed for over three months due to the coronavirus pandemic. During the first week of December, it handled 16.899 travellers, while just between December 19 and December 23, it processed 23.000 passengers. Overall, the number of flight operations decreased by some 50%. Due to the new strain of the coronavirus found in the United Kingdom, flights from London have been suspended.
Driving the lower passenger decline at Pristina Airport when compared to others in Europe is the diaspora. “Our traffic mainly relies on the diaspora, which lives and works abroad, meaning most of them hold citizenship and/or residency permits of the countries they are living in. Based on the abovementioned reasons, our passengers are not as affected by document limitations, while their desire to come and visit their families back in Kosovo continues despite the pandemic. This is one of the main reasons that passenger figures have seen a smaller decline compared to other regional airports, especially in the last two to three months”, Pristina Airport’s Chief Operations Officer, Gokmen Aritay, told EX-YU Aviation News.
Pristina Airport is in the process of extending its runway from 2.500 to 3.000 metres, while its Instrument Landing System (ILS) will be upgraded from category II to category IIIb, enabling aircraft to land in more adverse weather conditions. “90% of the work has been completed, however, due to the local and global effects of the pandemic, the project has been re-scheduled in cooperation with all the stakeholders and is now planned for completion in July 2021”, Mr Aritay said. He added, “We believe that our immediate goals in the short-term will be to intensify cooperation with our partner, which in this case is the Government of Kosovo, so we can jointly overcome the uncertainties and challenges ahead of us”.
That's a very good result all things considering.
ReplyDeletewow
ReplyDeleteGoes to show that airport relying on diaspora traffic will recover much faster.
ReplyDeleteWithout doubt.
DeleteCongrats Pristina. Solid result for an airport in covid era. Good work.
ReplyDeleteIt used to be 3rd once a upon a time, ahead of DBV and SPU but then they overtook it.
ReplyDeleteIf Kosovo didn't have visa restrictions, Pristina they would still be ahead of Dubrovnik and Split.
Delete@09:04
DeleteOver took what?
They overtook Pristina Airport.
DeleteLet's see if they can maintain that spot in 2021.
ReplyDeleteI think Zagreb will be back to number 2 this year.
DeleteDoubt it, we saw these days that airlines keep on delaying ZAG. Maybe in 2022.
Deletelets hope the pandamic keeps on so PRN can keep second place ;)
DeletePandemic or not, they have the opportunity to keep second or third position for a while.
DeleteWe don't know how BEG did but maybe they overtook them. BEG had a rather bad year with complete lockdown.
DeleteTry not to write nonsrnse. Belgrade had over 1 million passengers in September already. And I don't know what complete lockdown you are talking about. It reopened over a month before Pristina.
DeleteSo they probably had close to a million in 2020?
ReplyDeleteIt needs to reduce its fees.
ReplyDeleteThey give some nice incentives out now.
DeleteThe problem with Pristina is that the government sets the fees, not the airport operator.
DeleteWho made such a concession agreement where the government sets prices at the airport. Ludicrous.
DeleteIt is not true that the Government sets the fees. The Government has adopted a regulation on this topic, given that according to ECAA it has to have such regulation, however Prishtina Airport is excluded from remit of regulation for the duration of PPP agreement. Reg 3/2015 on Airport Charges, more specifically Article 17 states the following:
DeleteArticle 17
Specific Regulation for Prishtina International Airport Adem Jashari
The provisions of this Regulation for Prishtina International Airport “Adem
Jashari” shall be implemented in accordance with the PPP Agreement, during the
time that this agreement is in force.
With the runway extension, widebodies will be able to land at PRN without a problem.
ReplyDeletePristina handled Swiss 777 and Edelweiss A330 last year without a problem. It also handled a United 747 once.
DeleteThe United one was in 2015 but the plane had a light load, just some army personell. Plane from Zurich can land with widebody but for a full long haul flight it wuld be very difficult.
DeleteI see. Makes sense. Thank you
DeleteAnon 9.14, just out of curiosity, why should be more difficult for a widebody in long houl?
DeleteBecause it needs much more fuel, hence, the aircraft weighs much more, therefore requireing a longer runway to land, and even more to take off from.
DeleteI'm surprised Croatia Airlines no longer flies to Pristina. Couldn't they have used this route to feed their West Europe flights?
ReplyDeletePeople need to understand OU offers nothing to these airports. They serve O&D demand plusLH Group.
DeleteThe majority of passengers from/to PRN are from LH Group hubs.
DeleteRoute was struggling for years, even though it was scheduled to link onto the morning wave.
DeleteMorning 'wave'
DeleteIt just proves that you need to have at least 2 but ideally 3+ frequencies daily to cater for transfer passengers.
Delete09:10
DeleteNothing? What does that mean? Does JU also offers nothing in that case?
Huh? JU doesn't fly to PRN but given their crazy success in Tirana I'm sure they have something to offer to passengers.
DeleteBut OU is usually doing better then JU in Skopje and Sarajevo. How does that mean OU has nothing to offer?
DeleteBecause O&D has to fly to ZAG because road is quite long and/or bad which is not the case with Belgrade. Road from Sarajevo to Zagreb is horrible and long.
DeleteSame as road from Sarajevo to Belgrade. Still i dont see you answer again on my question what do you mean by OU has nothing to offer to Prishtina or overall.
DeleteBecause there is O&D demand from Zagreb to Sarajevo and Skopje. Not so much to PRN
DeleteSo OU has to offer something to PRN? Ok, i understand you know.
DeleteNo, they don't have something to offer because if they did they would not have suspended flights. Their network is stagnating and it's not organized in order to offer connections.
DeletePlease don't put JU in the same category as OU. Their network is light years ahead of OU and that's a fact.
They suspended flights because of competition by Adria Airways which flew multiple daily flights to LJU, FRA and MUC. Croatia Airlines can offer conections to Munich, Frankfurt, Zurich, Bruxelles, Vienna, Paris and Copenhagen which have many albanians living there. And OU flies to all these destinations more then daily.
DeleteI put these airlines in same category because they are literaly same. Around 2-3 mil. passangers, about 15-25 planes in fleet, money losing, southeasten europe, national carriers... i dont see a significant difference if we look at all european airlines.
So with which airline is then JU in category? And what about all these european destinations where a lot of albanians live and OU has a llt lf frequenices to there? Thats nothing to you?
DeleteWell what about FRA, MUC, VIE, BRU, CDG, AMS, CPH, ZRH? Is that nothing?
DeleteSorry for mutliple comments, i thought they were not posted at all.
DeleteThere was no need for you to write three separate comments. One was enough.
DeleteSo OU is so weak that it was butchered even by JP? That says a lot. JU at least managed to successfully fight them off in BEG and in TIA they were slowly eating away their market.
OU and JU might be in the same range but that's only because of summer traffic on the coast. Here we are talking about the hub middle. Look at OU's OMO schedule to, for example AMS. Good connection one way and then 15 hours the other way. JU has an extensive network. OU cant fly in winter to places like Milan or Prague.
What OU offers is what OS can offer so much better. OU can always rely on its regional feed from OSI and OMO.
So, they suspended flights because of competition. What makes you think they would succeed now?
DeleteAnd how would those flights work in winter? Why would someone fly with OU to VIE, MUC, FRA, CPH...and not on OS?
DeleteJU fought them off in BEG (isnt that JUs market?) and TIA? Or they went in bankrupcy? And back in a day JP was strong transfer carrier, and they had a base in PRN. So for OU which had at its peek in PRN daily flights, it was not so high profitabile to stay when JP offered direct flights to their major markets from PRN.
DeleteAnd? So what? They are in same range. Period. You never mentioned you are talking about hubs. Which are not so simmilar, but still they are small when you look at other major European airlines
And with this OSI and OMO comment it is obviously you are here just to mock and bash OU.
Anon 16:36
DeleteI dont know, but passangers from Sarajevo and Skopje are doing it.
Arent many people from Kosovo using Skopje airport which has double daily flights to ZAG with OU? They can always use these.
DeleteWhat happened to SKP? Weren't they very close to PRN last year?
ReplyDeleteIt has been more affected by the EU entry ban. Also I assume more people from Kosovo that used to fly to SKP before tried to go directly to Kosovo this time because of all the entry requirements.
DeleteKosovo was the only Yu market which wasnt affected by Swiss quarantine rules. Great success for PRN but this Switzerland loophole contributed mostly to it :D
DeleteDidn't Kosovo also have Swiss quarantine during height of summer?
Deletein the beginning yes. there was an article here when they changed it
DeleteWasn't Edelweiss sending A330s on a regular basis to deal with demand?
DeleteGood for the airport but overall bad for the country if so many people would rather live abroad than in a home country... :(
ReplyDeletebut this is the case with more or less all exyu states. If i am not wrong, only Slovenia has more inhabitants today than in the 90ties. and when those countries enter EU it will be even worse ... croatia "lost" almost 200K ppl in last 10 years.
DeleteA very important perspective. In fact, we should be much happier with the growth of non-diaspora-related air passengers, as the figures on air passengers from the diaspora tell us more about the poor economic situation in the former Yugoslavia (with the exception of Slovenia) than about the level of development of air traffic.
DeleteCongrats Pristina!
ReplyDeleteWizz Air should open a base there.
ReplyDelete+1
DeleteThey are expanding all the time. They introduced Milan and Baden Baden last week.
DeleteDoes Eurowings still have a base in PRN?
DeletePristina airport, or better said, Kosovo Government should start changing the policy and start implementing subsidies as Macedonian Government. Then we could see someone serious open a base.
DeleteRelying only on diaspora traffic isn't sustainable in the long run.
ReplyDeleteHow long does Limak's concession of Pristina Airport run for?
ReplyDeleteUntil 2030.
DeleteThey won a 20 year concession in 2010.
Thanks. Still a while to go.
DeleteThey should work on attracting flights from Amsterdam, Paris, Copenhagen and Rome.
ReplyDeleteHighly unlikely in these circumstances.
DeleteIt's surprising that Lufthansa does not fly to Pristina. They could easily pack passengers to the US via Frankfurt, not to mention all the diaspora from Germany.
ReplyDeleteLH has very high costs, that's why they don't fly to SKP either.
DeleteThey also don't fly to ZAG right now.
DeleteThey don't fly to many destinations at the moment.
DeleteDo they fly year round in ex-yu only to BEG and LJU?
DeleteIts because they care about profit. Unprofitabile OS is flying to all these balkan destinations for transfers and making low profits.
DeleteThey fly year round to Zagreb and Sarajevo. Covid winter can't be taken into account.
DeleteAt this moment is it only BEG and LJU?
DeleteAround 80% reduced operations on those routes compared to last winter.
Delete^ don't you realise his only asking so you say yes so he can feel superior for 5 minutes. Just give it to the kid. Regardless of the fact that there are fewer flights from his city to Frankfurt then ZAG for example
DeleteExcellent result for PRN taking into account what's going on around in Europe at the moment. It will be interesting to see whether the new airport in Kukes will open this year and whether will have anything to offer at all?!
ReplyDeleteIf that opens and becomes an ultra low cost airport as previously indicated that is going to affect the numbers in PRN and the numbers in Skopje.
DeleteDoubt it will happen, the concessionaires in PRN and TIA would try to kill it.
DeleteApparently the Albanian PM mentioned about 2 months ago that the airport will offer links to cities which are neither served by TIA nor by PRN. I am not sure what else is there to cover from Kukes which is not already covered by the above mentioned airports....
DeleteThe airport will cover north Albania and majority of south Kosovo
DeleteSo basically it will be for north Albania and Metohija. Not much in terms of population.
DeleteWell not necessarily. Kukës is easily accessible from both Tirana and Pristina. It remains to be seen whether there will actually be any airline interested or they will have to give subsidies/incentives
DeleteKukës will be really atractive for North Albania and Rrafshi i Dukagjinit.
DeleteBut if tickets will be cheap, I dont exclude that people will come from NM or even MNE.
What's interesting is that PRN has no transfer/ connecting traffic.
ReplyDeleteYes but they have a huge diaspora that only keeps on getting bigger and bigger.
DeleteGreat results for PRN considering covid and entry ban.
ReplyDeleteCongrats Pristina!
ReplyDeleteKeep going forward -->>
Nice for them but also don't forget that its the only airport in the country.
ReplyDeleteDo you really think there needs to be more than 1 airport there?
DeleteEven in times like this? Amazing, good work PRN
ReplyDeleteHappy to hear good news for PRN.
ReplyDeleteThey still had a passenger decline of almost 60%... Not sure how good the news is.
Deleteof which 65% passengers to/from Switzerland :)
ReplyDeleteno quarantine rules upon entering Swiitzerland was all this airport needed :D
on a serious note how many people (stil) live there now aprox. ?
In KaM, Around 970.000
DeleteIn Kosovo, around 1.9 million
DeleteIt's a myth that it's 1.9 million. There hasn't been a serious census is who knows how long. Estimates are that numbers have come down to below one million.
DeleteNo, estimates are
Deletethat numbers are 1.9 millon, based on official sources.
Estimates of frustrated people say that in Kosovo live less than a million people. Last official census in 2011 says that in Kosovo live almost 1.9 million people.
Deleteend of year results probably gonna look like this:
ReplyDelete1. BEG 2.PRN 3.ZAG 4. SKP 5.SPU 6.DBV ...
And LJU around the bottom :(
DeleteThis could mean they could have had one of the smallest declines in Europe.
ReplyDeleteIn the wider region TIA has far better results than ZAG this year and now we see that in ex-yu even PRN has achieved more than ZAG.
ReplyDeleteThere is also the airport in Đakovica/Gjakova which is in southwestern Kosovo. Not sure if it is operational, but has a runway of 1.75km. Both Đakovica/Gjakova and Kukës airports are only 50km apart, and about 1.20 hours driving time, and the same distance to Prizren.
ReplyDeleteSo Đakovica/Gjakova Airport could shake up the regional airport wars if it began to receive flights.
If Kukes becomes successful, than we gonna see Djakovica
Deleteairport start to develop.
Until the Limak concession of PRN expires in 2030, Gjakova airport can not operate commercial flights. It is part of concession agreement.
DeleteLH was supposed to start flights in record time:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.exyuaviation.com/2020/09/belgrade-pristina-flights-to-launch-in.html