Five EX-YU capitals see London passenger growth in Q1

All capital city airports in the former Yugoslavia have seen passenger numbers on their London flights improve in the first quarter of 2023 compared to the pre-pandemic 2019, with Ljubljana being the notable exception. Four years ago, the Slovenian capital had the largest share of London passengers among the former Yugoslav capitals with Ljubljana handling 50.017 travellers in Q1 2019. However, by 2023, that figure had declined by 54.7% to 22.667, behind Zagreb, Belgrade and Pristina. The figures were not impacted by Adria Airways’ demise, as it did not fly to London in 2019. On the other hand, Zagreb added over 23.000 passengers on services to and from London. The growth was fuelled by Ryanair which launched flights between the two cities in 2021. Notably, Ryanair, operating out of Stansted Airport, has overtaken both Croatia Airlines and British Airways, which maintain services to Heathrow. Although Croatia Airlines has seen its passenger numbers to London plummet compared to 2019, the difference was made up by Ryanair. In total, the budget carrier handled 28.838 passengers between Zagreb and London, compared to 25.506 travellers welcomed on board by Croatia Airlines and British Airways.

Belgrade Airport’s figures improved on 2019 despite having the same number of flights, however, Wizz Air has increased capacity on the route by deploying its Airbus A321 aircraft instead of the A320. The budget carrier outperformed Air Serbia by handling 23.777 passengers during the first quarter, compared to Air Serbia’s 15.303. Pristina saw a notable 60% increase in passenger numbers to London, with all its customers on the route handled by Wizz Air. Both easyJet and British Airways, which maintained flights between the two cities in 2022, have discontinued their operations, although they both operated outside of the first quarter making no impact on existing figures. Podgorica’s strong growth on the London service is also attributed to Wizz Air, which commenced flights between the two cities during the summer of 2022.

Skopje’s London figures increased slightly, with Wizz Air being the sole operator on the route. On the other hand, Sarajevo Airport had no flights to London during the first quarter of 2019. In contrast, during Q1 2023, two carriers maintained services between the two capitals. This included Wizz Air’s service to Luton, as well as TUI Airways’ new seasonal winter operations from Gatwick, catering for British skiers. TUI’s flights commenced in January and were maintained once per week until the end of March. The airline plans to restore services to Sarajevo on December 31. Wizz Air suspended operations between Luton and Bosnia and Herzegovina’s capital in late March, with flights scheduled to resume in September.