The carrier British Airways has considerably reduced its presence at London's second airport, Gatwick, in recent years. The airline now operates only a few long-haul flights, mainly to leisure destinations.
However, it still wants to return to the South London hub with the gradual lifting of restrictions and define a strategy to win back market share. In recent years, British Airways has gradually lost ground to low-cost competition.
In 2019, on the 46.6 million passengers at Gatwick, e...
The carrier British Airways has considerably reduced its presence at London's second airport, Gatwick, in recent years. The airline now operates only a few long-haul flights, mainly to leisure destinations.
However, it still wants to return to the South London hub with the gradual lifting of restrictions and define a strategy to win back market share. In recent years, British Airways has gradually lost ground to low-cost competition.
In 2019, on the 46.6 million passengers at Gatwick, easyjet was first in line with 19 million passengers. That's a market share of 40%. Last year, traffic at Gatwick barely reached 10.2 million passengers. But easyjet has succeeded in increasing its market share. With 4.8 million passengers, easyjet accounted for 47% of all passenger traffic.
A British Airways low-cost airline
Also, British Airways is working on the creation of a low-cost airline. No name has yet been revealed, but it could be called British Airways Express, like its Spanish counterpart Iberia within IAG. The carrier could begin operations in March for the IATA summer season.. It would offer flights to Europe as well as domestic routes in the UK.
The carrier could benefit from the Vinci Group's development plan, which would enable it toto welcome some 75 million passengers a year to Gatwick by 2038. One of the highlights of the expansion plan would be to use the north runway on a permanent basis. At present, this runway is only used when the main runway is not operational. In fact, the short distance between the two runways prevents them from being used in parallel.
But by moving the centre of the runway by 12 metres, the airport would benefit from a system of simultaneous runways. This would enable Gatwick to make up for the lack of capacity in the London airport system. Consultations with users and local residents are due to begin in December.
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