Norwegian Air Shuttle has become the latest carrier to be granted subsidies for the upkeep of its flights to Sarajevo following a public call that was primarily aimed at the introduction of new routes. Norwegian maintains services from Oslo and Stockholm to Bosnia and Herzegovina’s capital on a seasonal summer basis. It is expected to upgrade the pair to year-round operations following the financial assistance, although this is yet to be confirmed. The only other carrier to apply for the latest subsidy tender was Air Arabia, however, its application was submitted past the set deadline and was not taken into consideration as a result.
The development brings the total number of routes subsidised out of Sarajevo to fifteen. The policy, launched last year by the local tourism authority, has attracted Ryanair, which will commence flights from Bergamo, Charleroi, Gothenburg, London Stansted, Memmingen and Thessaloniki, although the latter is not part of the subsidy program, Aegean Airlines with services from Athens and Skopje, SunExpress from Antalya and Izmir, as well as Wizz Air with a planned new service from Rome (yet to be scheduled). The remaining routes that will now receive subsidies are already served, including Abu Dhabi by Wizz Air Abu Dhabi, Warsaw by LOT Polish Airlines, and the abovementioned Oslo and Stockholm.
Sarajevo Airport is poised for strong growth this summer based on existing scheduled capacity. At this point, there are 1.628.399 seats on the market on Sarajevo flights this summer, representing an increase of 29.7% compared to the same period last year, and up 14% on the previous record in the summer of 2022. Turkish Airlines will be the largest carrier in Sarajevo based on available capacity, followed by Pegasus Airlines, Austrian Airlines, Wizz Air Abu Dhabi and Flydubai. Ryanair, which commences operations to Bosnia and Herzegovina’s capital at the end of next month, will become the sixth largest airline in Sarajevo. Carriers that already maintain operations to Sarajevo that will increase their frequencies this summer compared to last include Jazeera Airways, Flynas, Flyadeal, Qatar Airways and Kuwait Airways, to name a few.
This is loosing its purpose. Routes that were already being served for years are now getting subsidies.
ReplyDelete+1
DeleteThe subsidies are for those flights to be not only in summer, but throughout the year .
DeleteThey're being paid to fly routes they'd fly regardless
Delete@Kum
DeleteI think you are wrong. TUI has been granted subsidies but they wlll just keep flying the route in winter.
Maybe we should subsidize passengers. And if that doesn't work let's blackmail them...
DeleteTUI hasn't be give any subsidies, they started flying winter skiing charters last season because of the interest shown by British tourist industry. It was much better than expected, so they have just continued flying them this season. [S.K.]
DeleteIs there any chance for Ryanair to open a base in SJJ?
ReplyDeleteThey usually don't have bases outside of the EU (excluding UK obviously). Even in Tirana where they have a lot of traffic, they have no planes based there.
DeleteLikewise for a lot of airports in Morocco, where they fly from several of their EU bases but don't have actual planes there. Or Jordan as well
DeleteRyanair will have 14 aircraft based in Morocco for summer 2024.
DeleteLol
DeleteMorocco has more pax then exyu combined
DeleteWhich is normal
Deletenot for some readers here, even towns of Germany and Sweden are perceived as "villages"
DeleteVery strong growth!
ReplyDelete1,6 pax wow
ReplyDeletethats seats
DeleteThat's a lot of subsidised routes.
ReplyDeleteThey announced the Oslo and Stockholm flights as brand new and never served in the past which is complete nonsense. What they did was just give money for two routes that have been served for years. They did the same with LOT and several other airlines and routes.
ReplyDeleteI agree. They are misleading the public. This is what they said
Delete"Kao rezultat Javnog poziva za subvencioniranje aviosaobraćaja na području Kantona Sarajevo koji provodi Vlada Kantona Sarajevo u saradnji sa Turističkom zajednicom KS i Međunarodnim aerodromom Sarajevo, glavni grad Bosne i Hercegovine će uskoro biti direktno uvezan sa skandinavskim zemljama. "
Of course 99% of the public does not even know that both routes are already served.
By public, you mean the people following this blog? 😀
DeleteNo, because most people following this blog know that these routes have been in operation. Especially since it is highlighted in the article that they operate seasonally, unlike Bosnian media which announced them as brand new routes.
DeleteThey were hoping to get SAS but SAS wasn't interested.
ReplyDeleteSource?
DeleteSource is some Kafana na Balkanu. 🤣
DeleteSAS was interested, they applied to one of the tenders but got rejected for incomplete documentation. Unlike Norwegian they didn't reapply
DeleteHow is the SKP route doing, does anyone have some insight? Is anyone flying that route at all? :)
ReplyDeletehttps://www.exyuaviation.com/2023/11/trip-report-aegean-athens-sarajevo-via.html?m=1
DeleteYou can read it and decide if anyone flies that line .
Small error in 2nd paragraph (Aegean Airlines with services from Athens and Skopje), they fly to Sarajevo from Skopje
ReplyDeleteNevermind I'm an idiot, thought the article was about Skopje, forget about this
DeleteThere will be direct flight from ATH to SJJ twice weekly as well
DeleteIt's going to be a big year for SJJ!
ReplyDeletewhat were terms? and what do they get?
ReplyDeleteit means a new tender especially for AirArabia. Koji cirkus!
ReplyDeleteTrue, this one was specifically for Norwegian like they said a few weeks ago.
DeleteCan they bring AA American Airlines, you pay, we come, you know, no money no honey.
ReplyDeleteI don't think they have enough money that can cover the costs of an AA flight to SJJ
DeleteAlso they would have to invest a lot of money into the airport to meet FAA's safety standards.
Delete^ I think that was the issue 2-3 years ago when Eastern Airlines announced flights from Chicago to Sarajevo.
DeleteWhy would they announce flights if SJJ didn't meet FAA standards
DeleteBecause it's Eastern Airlines....they are a bit of a mess of a company.
DeleteI'm disappointed that there are no Vueling flights to Barcelona. The Sarajevo airport management said many times they were in talks with them but it doesn't seem to have produced any results.
ReplyDelete+1
DeleteHope they come eventually though.
Vueling can not sustain flights to Zagreb and Belgrade, but you expect them in Sarajevo lol
DeleteCan Sarajevo reach 2 million passengers this year?
ReplyDeleteThis year no , maybe 1.7 . Next year , I hope 😎
DeleteThis is great. It means Norwegian and LOT will keep flying their routes in winter too.
ReplyDeleteNo, it does not. They will keep just seasonal flights.
DeleteWe shall see as its stil unclear if norwegian will fly year-round or just an extened seasonal time. LOT have made certain increase in both number of flights and period, i assume they are trying to slowly enter the market and perhaps make it to a full year flight by 2025/2026
DeleteAre there any tender conditions at all?
ReplyDeletelol (and am not laughing at you)
DeleteWhy OU and JU don't apply for their flights to ZAG/BEG?
ReplyDeleteMaybe they will apply as well, kako je pochelo…
DeleteBecause there are cities for which subsides they are giving. They are not giving for BG or ZG. They want better connection with West Europe.
DeleteA lot of passengers who fly from or to SJJ transfer in BEG or ZAG. And some people even go TO BEG. So if JU decides to start AMS-SJJ, ARN-SJJ than the BEG-SJJ is gonna perfrom worse and they are also gonna miss SJJ passengers on their BEG-AMS and BEG-ARN flights. So investing in A means losing money in B. The opportunity costs are too high.
DeleteI have certain insight to this but the LF on the Beh flights are performing worse than the ZAG flights, not to mention that BEG flights only operate 1 daily flight. Most transfers are performed by VIE, IST and FRA. Sometimes by ZAG and the flights to BEG are rarely transfer passengers and often point to point ones
DeleteWill Aegean's ATH flights e year round or just seasonal? They seem to end in 28 October 2024.
ReplyDeleteConsidering the size of the airport and the fact that they do not have a national carrier, i believe they are doing a great job
ReplyDeleteWhy not try and get British,Air France,KLM,Aer Lingus
ReplyDeleteWell they never applied. Ryanair and wizz already fly to London and thats enough considering the visa policies. KLM have issues with slots at amsterdam airport so i dont think SJJ is their priority
DeleteThe main question is: Can airport really handle so much traffic and so many passengers?
ReplyDeleteYes, it got expanded only recently. Although with this pace of growth, they'll need more space by 2026.
DeleteI know why I'm asking. I've seen them struggling last summer.
DeleteThey've been struggling because the passport terminal part wasn't renovated yet and they lacked border police officers so the passport checks were slow and passengers queued for a long time, state is the one deciding those quotas, they increased them slightly but they need to increase them even more, that's more of a state issue.
DeleteBesides the border patrol issues, airport's ground handling was on the verge of collapse.
DeleteSAS has opened a direct route to Sarajevo from Copenhagen, starting from 3 July. Tickets can already be bought on the SAS website.
ReplyDelete