UK. BAA’s UK airports handled a total of 14.9 million passengers in August, a drop of -1.7% on the same month last year. In the year to date BAA’s UK airports traffic shows a decline of -0.9% to 100 million compared to January-August 2007.
The company said the drop “could be seen as modest” against the backdrop of “toughening economic conditions”.
The trend in figures for the first eight months has been driven by a decline in domestic traffic (-5%) versus an increase in the most profitable long haul traffic (+1%) and virtual stagnation of European flights (-0.5%), said BAA.
The pattern of August traffic follows recent trends with an increase in North Atlantic long haul traffic (+1.3%) compared to stagnation in European activity (-1.0%) and falling domestic traffic (-6.5%).
Traffic at Heathrow, BAA’s largest airport, remains unchanged, with a drop of just -0.2% helped by a +15.6% increase in North Atlantic traffic as a result of Open Skies.
Gatwick fell by -1.2%, where a +13.7% gain in European scheduled traffic was not enough to offset the -29.3% drop in North Atlantic traffic due to the shift of long haul traffic to Heathrow in the wake of Open Skies.
Stansted recorded a drop of -4.7%. In Scotland, Edinburgh was just -1.0% lower, but Glasgow and Aberdeen dropped by -5.2% and -5.4% respectively in the month.
Naples Airport reported a -0.3% fall in August traffic, with year-to-date passenger volumes up +3.2%.
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