Lufthansa plans to increase frequencies to a number of cities in the former Yugoslavia from March 26, 2023, including Ljubljana, Belgrade, Zagreb, Dubrovnik and Sarajevo. It comes after the airline announced the launch of a new ten weekly service from Frankfurt to Skopje starting in April of next year.
The German carrier will introduce a new daily service from both Frankfurt and Munich to Ljubljana. As a result, it will maintain three daily rotations from Frankfurt and a double daily service from Munich. The airline will operate an additional fourteen weekly flights into the Slovenian capital for a total of 35 weekly rotations. All flights are currently scheduled to be performed with the CRJ900 aircraft, however, equipment changes are likely and may vary.
In Belgrade, Lufthansa will add an extra daily flight from Frankfurt for a total of three daily rotations, or 21 weekly services. All are scheduled to operate with the Airbus A320-family fleet. The flights will complement its triple-daily Munich service on which it will deploy the A320-family jets, representing an increase in overall capacity on the route. In total, the airline plans to maintain 42 weekly flights into the Serbian capital.
Lufthansa will add an additional daily service from Munich to Zagreb for a total of two daily flights or fourteen weekly services from March 26. The carrier will boost capacity on the route by maintaining all operations with the A320-family aircraft. Frequencies from Frankfurt will remain unchanged at double daily, however, the airline will boost capacity from Embraer and Bombardier jets to the larger A319 aircraft. In total, Lufthansa will run 28 weekly flights to the Croatian capital. The German carrier will also grow on the coast by adding an extra two weekly flights from Munich to Dubrovnik for a total of ten weekly with a mix of A319 and A320 aircraft. However, its daily Frankfurt - Dubrovnik service will be taken over by low cost subsidiary Eurowings Discover.
The German national carrier will strengthen its presence in Sarajevo next summer by adding an additional three weekly flights from Frankfurt for a total of ten weekly rotations. The airline introduced services to Bosnia and Herzegovina’s capital last year, replacing its previous Munich service. Lufthansa will serve Sarajevo with a mix of morning and evening flights with its A320-family fleet.
Operations to other cities in the former Yugoslavia will remain mostly unchanged, although the resumption of some of its seasonal services will occur earlier than during the summer of 2022. Furthermore, flights between Frankfurt and Rijeka will be decreased from two to one weekly.
Lufthansa summer 2023 operations from Frankfurt
Lufthansa summer 2023 operations from Munich
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Excellent news for all airports involved
ReplyDeleteThis will be most felt in Ljubljaba considering low levels of traffic. Great news
ReplyDelete"Ljubljaba" .... hahahah.
DeleteI love how people don't reread what they write.
No Skopje on the Frankfurt list
ReplyDeleteOf course Skopje is on the list
DeleteBravo!
ReplyDeleteI hope this action does not end like the one from Swiss some years ago, where they also announced expansion in ex-yu to then pull back not long after
ReplyDeleteI guess Cartel's market share in LJU will increase to about 50%
ReplyDeleteCan you please explain why you are calling LH group a cartel ??
Delete"A cartel is a group of independent market participants who collude with each other in order to improve their profits and dominate the market" LH Group, Fraport and Kuehne+Nagel all control LJU. All of them are connected to dominate at LJU in passenger and freight market share. LJU is owned by Fraport, LH Group owns Fraport and Klaus Michael-Kuehne owns 17.5% of Lufthansa and also owns more than 50% of Kuehne+Nagel, which has the biggest logistics center at LJU. All of that clearly explains why there is no growth at LJU, why airlines are leaving LJU and why is focus put only on LH and freight.
DeleteAnd this prevents other airlines come to LJU ?? I certainly don't think so ! Things are simple . LJU is a small and unproffitable market and most of all not strong as a tourist destination. That's all !
DeleteLooks like you didn't understand what I wrote. Its completely normal that all other airports grow except for LJU. Its completely normal that LJU went from 3 busiest airport in EX-YU to not even in top 10. Its completely normal that airlines that have been flying to LJU for years and years (Easyjet, Wizz) are leaving. All of this is completely normal. Maybe for Cartel fanboys is, for others isn't.
DeleteAnon @9:45 has written everything you need to know about Cartel in LJU. Currently airport is afloat because of the plots they are selling, because of the long term aircraft parking and Adria Tehnika. Core business is almost non-existing. The Cartel bought the airport when Adria (like Croatia - Cartel feeder) was still providing the majority of the pax. All went downhill when they belly landed. And will never get better. Never ever, because they don't change the model, just as in case of Croatia. They keep the old model, although it has proven itself as worthless, out of time and place and non-sustainable in short, let alone in long term and that it is a fact, that sans help from govt, they would also belly land soon. As far as AirSerbia, well, I would compare them with Turkish - strong public and less public support (not only moral, but also financial) not only to keep it afloat, but to make it big enough to be more resilient to failure. But we saw in the past, that size doesn't matter (when it comes resilience towards failure). And that is why our friend Pozdrav is nagging all along...
Deleteno, @9.45 is just the usual carsija rekla-kazala. Nobody is preventing an airline to fly to LJU. a rather ridiculous statement
DeleteYes anon 10:52, it is very logical that LH (which owns Fraport that owns LJU) would love to see Fraport bring all that competition to LJU for LH to compete with. You are just so delusional.
Delete@10.57 im sure you would be a super airport manager!
DeleteAnd I'm sure you would be amazing writter of fairy tales about how everything is perfect in LJU.
DeleteBefore it was sold to the Germans, when Adria was still alive, it wasn't exactly a very busy airport either. Just like Zagreb before Ryanair. All continental airports in Ex-Yu are very price sensitive
Delete@ 11:41
DeleteThat’s true. People keep forgetting that. The airport only had record numbers twice: 2008 and 2018 and even then it wasn’t bursting by the seems.
my dear friend Pozdrav, it seems some people are offended by the name Cartel, so let's adapt. Let's call it Lufthansa & friends, or Lufthadeze. What do you think? (wink, wink)
Delete5 friends its the best name for it.
DeleteInterestingly, LH doesn't seem to care about hurting OS anymore- seems they need those feeds to FRA.
ReplyDeleteMy guess is that Lufthansa also needs to keep FRA happy so as to make sure they don't flirt with the LCCs again.
DeleteIf Lufthansa and its partners are growing then FRA will have no need to strike a deal with Ryanair, Wizz Air and so on.
Frankfurt Airport has a very good location and is well connected with the whole densely populated area. There is also a lot of O&D demand to fill those seats.
Bravo Hrvatska!
ReplyDeleteFor OU market share dropping from 16 to 12 %?
DeleteLufthansa has been performing well in Belgrade this winter. FRA is mostly operated by A320 with the A319 and A321 sent from time to time. MUC has seen minimal schedule cuts which indicates a healthy performance.
ReplyDeleteLooking at the new schedule from FRA, it's obvious that Lufthansa is hitting JU as their flights will now depart with a 30 minute difference. Personally I expected an early morning departure from FRA to offer connections from the early morning arrivals. A lot of long-haul flights return to their home base at around 05.00 to 06.00. Most of these require a 4 to 5 hour connection in FRA.
Looking at this morning's arrivals this is what we have:
05.15 JFK
05.15 BOS
05.20 HND
05.25 ADD
05.30 JNB
05.30 NBO
05.30 ABV
05.35 WDH
05.40 IKA
05.45 ORD
06.00 SIN
And so on. Like I said, I expected an early morning departure from FRA but I guess they want to focus more on O&D and to hit JU which is already weak in FRA.
LH already has early morning departure every day from BEG.
DeleteOh sorry, now I see you meant from FRA...
DeleteBravo Lufthansa!
ReplyDeleteThey are clearly very dominant in the whole region including OS. No wonder why AF/KL are so passive indulged with "green" policies. LH Group was always smarter and neither Amsterdam nor Paris can already compete with Frankfurt and Munich.
ReplyDeleteIf you are flying from Belgrade then Vienna and Zurich are also convenient transfer points. From next summer both OS and LX should offer up to three daily flights each. In total we should have:
DeleteFRA 21
MUC 21
ZRH 21
VIE should also be 21 once they load their summer timetable
Add to that seasonal flights by EW and you get quite a solid presence.
@Anon 09:35 - you really fail to see the big picture, proper Eastern Euro style. Do you know anything about the taxes coming in 2028? If you did, you'd understand why AF/KLM and most of the western world is focusing on sustainable policies. It might be laughable to you, and obviously you think the evil decadent west is trying to destroy the family values of the East by introducing sustainable policies, but somebody needs to start reducing emissions, and it can obviously only be a Nigel, François or Hans, because Hrvoje, Uroš and Trajče definitely don't have the capacity to do so.
DeleteSustainable? With record miles flown by private jets? Sustainable yeah, right. History sure does repeat itself, yet people never learn.
DeleteExactly it's all for show and to get more money from taxes. Look at Switzerland which is about to ban electric cars. All this green agenda is very badly thought through.
DeleteWhilte western elite pilaged to get to where they are, now they want to styfle other nations from prosperity with this green agenda, while they peronsally dont abide by, as evident by their lavish lifestyles and consumerism
DeleteJasno je da ce ljubljana ostati uskoro samo sa lufhanzom
ReplyDeleteLet's just hope it doesn't end up like this year when they announced extra frequencies and then had to cancel everything because of a lack of staff.
ReplyDelete35 weekly flights from and to Ljubljana is literally insane. And this is excluding Brussels Airlines. No wonder why they are not interested working with new airlines. Ljubljana is unofficially a German regional airport now. The relationship with Fraport is more than evident.
ReplyDeleteLH 21 weekly FRA-LJU
DeleteLH 14 weekly MUC-LJU
LX 9 weekly ZRH-LJU
SN 6 weekly BRU-LJU
50 weekly flights for summer 2023. Just rename LJU to Ljubljana LH Cartel Airport.
pathetic
Deleteoh cmon. its not insane. its normal. Its even less than it was with adria (Vienna missing, Zurich and Brussels not on a same levels ... to 3 daily Frankfurt and double daily Munich is bare minimum.
DeleteWhat I like the most about those flights is that Munich will have early morning departure and late evening arrival. So there will be early morning departures to Munich (6.15), Paris (6.45) and Frankfurt (7.10).
LJU 6.15 - MUC 7.10
LJU 13.10 - MUC 14.05
MUC 11.35 - LJU 12.30
MUC 22.05 - LJU 23.00
LJU 7.10 - FRA 8.40
LJU 11.00 - FRA 12.25
LJU 14.05 - FRA 15.30
FRA 9.15. - LJU 10.25
FRA 12.15 - LJU 13.25
FRA 20.20 - LJU 21.30
People seem to forget that Slovenia’s economy is deeply tied to the German-speaking world so naturally most flights are aimed there.
DeleteWooowwww, super impressive. LH is taking a Rock n' Roll in Yugoslavia. Glad to see that LJU gets 2 daily more in SUTT 2023. Swiss as per current schedule will keep their 9 weekly too
ReplyDeleteWhat Ljubljana needs now that MUC will have a morning flight is morning flight to ZRH, flights are PACKED, and I guess the only limitation for them is lack of planes. Maybe Helvetic could schedule their own service?
ReplyDeletehow? Lufthansa group with all its tentacles owns asses all over Europe!
DeleteGo for revenue split; just like air dolomiti is doing? Maybe that would be the best case scenario for all
Deleteif theres no Germany most of the micro post-yu states would collapse since more then half of their exports go to Germany only. Plus having the biggest exyu diaspora in Europe im not surprised LH is increasing their share on the exyu market
ReplyDeleteWhat a nonsensical comment.
DeleteTechnically speaking Germany owns the Balkans. Fraport bought a stake of the main Greek airports including SKG and RHO for instance, not to mention the immense amount of flights between Turkey and Germany. They own 60% of Bulgaria's coastal airports and most importantly involved with Antalya Airport as well. SKP is connected to possibly every German village airport and we saw the other day here how busy the MUC route is from BEG. The Croatian coast is predominantly German as well and OU acting as a LH feeder.
DeleteEven if Romania has close relations with France, Germany has extended its tentacles over there as well. LH flies to OTP, TSR, SBZ (LH and OS), CLJ, Austrian to IAS.
So, LJU guys, your reactions are understandable. It is the only European airport, which is 100% owned by Fraport. You have all the info here in the 3rd column of the pdf file:
https://www.fraport.com/en/investors/traffic-figures.html
They got big debt in 2009 to buy Eastern and Southeastern Europe assets like 2000 billions. They make big fuss with Greece debts because German Banks were exposed.
Delete@ 10:58
DeleteI kind of agree.
LH canceled today all the flights from FRA & MUC to ZRH, GVA & BSL due to staff shortage and bad weather...
ReplyDeleteHow is that even ok? They need to be fined for such failure to plan ahead
DeleteNOOOOOO! Their flight crew are rude or extremely fake [sterile] in their politeness. None speak Serbian, so the elderly passengers have a really hard time with them. Plus it really sucks to fly through Frankfurt and have to clear security for transfers all the time. 9 out of 10 times we have to take the bus to the terminal.
ReplyDeleteUmm passengers from BEG haven't had to clear transfer security for like a year now. BEG is now considered a "clean" airport, like the US or UK ones.
DeleteYou expect German flight crew to speak Serbian?
DeleteYes, like JU hiring Chinese.
DeleteWhile I don't think they necessarily need to speak any local language, I do tend to agree that they are not necessarily friendly. I fly mostly with LH and OS, and with LH it has been my observation that there is a very big age difference with flight attendants. Either they are in their 50ties and 90% of this age group's attitude is work to rule, or they are young princesses who take a year or 2 or 3 off from their studies and work as a flight attendant so they can see the world. But indeed, neither try very much. And they can afford not to, as unions in this branch in Germany are extremely powerful, so the slightest frictions with corporate and they threaten with strikes and the staff shortages post-corona make things in this regard even worse.
DeleteThe whole LH experience is barely bearable. It is essentially a so-so planned and a so-so executed public transportation service.
ReplyDeleteNow, the above doesn't mean one won't use it when one has to, but if you can avoid it, you will.
As someone who does 50-60 flights on LH Group every year, I can't really agree. Sure, their product is extremely unimpressive, but in terms of reliability and especially IRROPS handling, they are still probably the best carrier in Europe.
DeleteI probably have slightly less that number of flights with LH annually, and I would not say their product is best in Europe, but I would also say they are not the worst.
DeleteThat was regarding economy and regarding their long haul premium product, this is definitively a big disappointment. Like, their screens are not even touch screens. Just ridiculous, and the rest of the service is also mediocre at best. And they somehow dare to call themselves a 5 star airline.
On a positive note, they announced a new business/first cabin, so hopefully things will improve there.
@Vlad:
DeleteI disagree. LH is one of the most unreliable and expensive airlines in Europe. If you transfer in FRA and you don’t have at least one and a half hours between flights, you will likely miss the connecting flight, since LH is almost always delayed. I rather fly with Ryanair - same product, more reliable. And much cheaper.
19:57 I love your comment. I am also a very Ryanair fan. Honestly, I flew with them probably more than 50 times and had almost ZERO issues. Punctual, reliable and very safe airline. They were not involved with 1 sole accident since their creation. Who cares if they say sell random stuff all the time? Just put your headphones and music and you are good to go. That being said, their BoB ain't extremely expensive. Gosh, in the golden era Ryanair used to sell tickets for literally 0,01€ and I am not joking.
DeleteAs for Lutfi, I flew with them from Frankfurt to Buenos Aires and the experience with the classic 747 was something. That was 8 years ago. As someone said, they became a bit sterile and even their logo is now so cold and indifferent. But, it still remains a reliable carrier overall but hate those Frankfurt and Munich transfers especially with the buses.
Sorry, can't relate. FRA can be a hot mess at times, but MUC is still the best transit airport in Europe.
DeleteA few years ago I would have definitely agreed with you. However, IMHO and just as Anonymous11:07 has pointed out, post-corona they are a barely average airline, also in terms of reliability.
ReplyDeleteIt seems that third daily flight from FRA to BEG is there only for SUTT.
ReplyDeleteIn November next year LH will again fly twice daily between FRA and BEG.
Their entire 2023/24 winter network is a copy of the 2022/23 winter network. Airlines haven't started planning for it yet.
DeleteOk, thanks.
DeleteDo they have staff for all this?
ReplyDeleteAnd does it really count as "21 weekly" when they cancel half of those? (I'm over exaggerating a bit, of course)
I remember when last flying with LH to SFInternational, how I was treated like an idiot when trying to get a hotel voucher for the overnight caused by their delayed flight from Belgrade. Had to wait for the hotel voucher for almost 5 hours. Not very pleasant when you are over 60. Also, on the way back they were late so I missed the flight to Belgrade. Incidentally, while waiting the issue to be resolved, I got acquainted with a lady working for German Ministry of Transport, on her way to Belgrade, too. She told me that LH was in terrible state, understaffed, fighting serious financial issues. And that was pre covid time.
ReplyDeleteHad a similar experience yesterday. Flight cancelled 3 hours before departure (paid 400 EUR for a one hour flight - last minute booking). I was offered an alternative flight the next day (useless, since I had to be in FRA that day). I cancelled the trip, returned home and 5 hours later (at 22:30) received an mail, stating that I was rebooked on an early morning flight?! I never requested rebooking and somehow I got it anyway. I spent the next hour calling LH Customer Support in order to cancel the rebooking and demand a refund. I finally got through and am now waiting to get my money back.
DeleteStay away from LH, it’s one of the worst and most expensive airlines in Europe.
Can David (Air Serbia) really take on Goliath (LH Group) for a piece of transfers from the exyu region to the US? It already does. TGD, SKP, ZAG and LJU are already on the Top 10 list of transfers to Air Serbia flights to JFK.
ReplyDeleteTriggered by JU BEG-JFK going daily and addition of ORD, LH reacted in a way that that questions if LH saw real, justified business opportunity in exyu region or if they just want to flex regardless of outcomes? As demonstrated by almost manic pace of naming changes for German/Eurowings projects in the past decade, LH is not always led by rational decisions.
You forgot the Eurowings "Discover" madness.
DeleteThere's more, there was Eurowings Jump longhaul project (operated by CityLine), then Eurowings operated by SunExpress Deutschland, there were plans to do Cityline 2 as part of Eurowings, fold Brussels into Eurowings etc.
Delete