AUSTRALIA. Australian airports continue to post healthy traffic figures for February.
Last week The Moodie Report revealed that international traffic at Sydney International Airport was up +8.8% and today Brisbane has done even better with February arriving passengers up +21% over the previous year, and departing passengers rising +23%.
BAC airline and cargo commercial manager Cam Macphee said: “The past six months for Brisbane have shown a strong and consistent trend, especially on the back of increased trans-Tasman competition and low airfares, with passengers on these routes up +41% on last year.
“Every month further strengthens the view that Brisbane Airport has fully recovered from the succession of major hits to the Australian travel and tourism industry over recent years. The Airport is significantly busier and this shows no sign of abating, which is great news for the travel industry, tourism operators, ground transport companies and the region’s economy in general. It reinforces the theory that a healthy, growing airport is critical to a healthy, growing economy.”
Nuance is the duty free retailer in Brisbane.
In February, Australian travellers were up +37% and New Zealand up +51%. However, Malaysian, Singaporean and Chinese passengers were below last year as a result of Chinese New Year celebrations occurring in January 2004 compared to February 2003.
The northern winter 2003 schedules have produced continued international traffic growth over recent months. Emirates and China Airlines both continued their strong growth, as did new international airline, Pacific Blue, which completed its first full month of operation in February operating a daily Brisbane to Christchurch service. During the month, Thai Airways also increased its Brisbane to Bangkok services from three to four times per week.
Note: Traffic results in February 2004 include an additional day’s operations compared with 2003 – 2004 being a leap year.
