10 November 2009

Key UK airports stemming passenger decline

BAA’s seven UK airports handled 12.3 million passengers last month, down by 1.4% on the same month last year.

Although still in decline, this was the best performance since June 2008, the company said.

There were "some encouraging indicators" of improvement at Heathrow, Gatwick and Edinburgh; a strong upturn in airline load factors and a recovery in cargo traffic.

Heathrow recorded a 1.0% increase in passengers and Gatwick (up 1.8%) achieved a monthly increase for the first time since May 2008. Edinburgh continued its recent run of improvement with a 3.8% gain in October, on the back of the introduction of new low cost routes to Europe.

Airlines at Stansted have cut capacity by 11.7% compared to last October, leading to a 10.1% fall in passengers. Glasgow (down 9.2%), Aberdeen (down 8.3%) and Southampton (down 6.4%) also all continued to see passenger traffic fall.

Long haul routes served by BAA’s airports (excluding North Atlantic) saw a 4.6% increase in passengers, including a 10% increase to the Middle East and 11.8% increase to India.

European scheduled routes saw an increase of 1.1%. North Atlantic routes recorded a 14.5% cutback in the number of seats offered and in these circumstances it was notable that the drop in passengers carried was only 4.8%.

UK Domestic routes recorded a similar experience with a decrease of passengers of 5.3%, although there was a 12.5% cut in seats offered.

In total across the Group the number of air transport movements contracted by 6% and the number of seats by a similar amount.

It was the 3.4 point gain in load factor (the percentage of seats filled) which helped the passenger total to decrease by only 1.4%, BAA said.

BAA chief executive Colin Matthews said: "This year has been one of the most challenging on record for the aviation industry, and the outlook remains difficult.

"Nevertheless, the figures across the group appear to be improving. Heathrow’s traffic figures were particularly encouraging and come as a result of the airport being the hub of a strong international long-haul route network."

by Phil Davies