{"id":82783,"date":"2019-01-30T17:29:43","date_gmt":"2019-01-30T16:29:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.voyages-d-affaires.com\/?p=82783"},"modified":"2019-02-06T10:46:16","modified_gmt":"2019-02-06T09:46:16","slug":"centralisation-aeroports-france","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.voyages-d-affaires.com\/en\/centralisation-aeroports-france","title":{"rendered":"Airports: France's skies struggle to shake off their centralised tradition"},"content":{"rendered":"

With more than 172 million<\/strong> passengers<\/strong> on its airports in 2018<\/strong>France is one of the five largest air transport countries in Europe, along with the UK, Spain, Germany and Italy. And yet, if you take a closer look at the figures for air transport in France, you will see that the country is one of the world's biggest air carriers. an exception in Europe\u00a0<\/strong>by the extreme centralisation<\/strong> of air traffic on Paris<\/strong>particularly for intercontinental services.<\/p>\n

The arrival this summer of Kuwait Airways in Nice<\/strong> with its two weekly frequencies and The Company on Newark<\/a><\/strong> with its four weekly frequencies, or the presence during the summer ofAir Transat<\/strong> at Basel-Mulhouse, Bordeaux and Lyon, Marseille<\/a>, Nantes<\/a>Nice and Toulouse (with two to five weekly frequencies) are the trees that hide the forest. Of all the great nations of Western Europe, France offers the most centralised air transport, an old Jacobin tradition of the power of Paris. To which we must add the tacit support of the civil aviation authorities for the national airline Air France<\/strong> and its Roissy hub<\/strong>. This situation translates into business travellers<\/strong> by longer intercontinental flight times<\/strong> because they have to use a third-party airport for a connecting flight.<\/p>\n

If we look at our European neighbours, each major country has at least two airports<\/strong> offering a complementarity<\/strong> with heavy intercontinental traffic. This is the case in Great Britain, where Manchester<\/a><\/strong> is the country's third-largest hub after London Heathrow and Gatwick, with more than 28 million passengers\u00a0<\/strong>in Italy, behind Rome Fiumicino looms\u00a0Milan<\/a> Malpensa<\/strong>a genuine alternative to air travel, which last year saw almost 25 million passengers<\/strong>. On the tarmac at Malpensa you'll find aircraft from Air China, American, Etihad and Air India. In Germany, Munich<\/strong> continues to gain weight against Frankfurt<\/strong> <\/a>with the decision of Lufthansa<\/strong> to transfer more intercontinental flights. Last year, the Bavarian capital's airport recorded 46.2 million passengers, a new record.<\/p>\n

There are even two major intercontinental airports in countries where passenger volumes are much lower than in France. In Switzerland<\/strong>, Geneva<\/strong> <\/a>handled 17.66 million passengers last year, more than Nice or Lyon in France. Although not a hub for the national airline Swiss, the hub in French-speaking Switzerland is linked to 11 intercontinental destinations<\/strong>of which Beijing<\/strong>, New York<\/a> <\/strong>or thea must Dubai<\/strong><\/a>. Recently, it was Ethiopian Airlines<\/strong> which began operations in Geneva. In Portugal, Porto - with 11 million passengers - is linked to New York, Luanda, Rio and Sao Paulo...<\/p>\n

France's excessive centralisation can be measured in particular by the ratio between the country's main airport - what could be described as a national hub such as Paris CDG, London Heathrow or Frankfurt - and the next two airports in terms of passenger numbers. The gap between Paris CDG and the top two regional airports - Nice and Lyon - is abysmal. With 13.8 million passengers in 2018,\u00a0Nice<\/strong> represents just 19.1% of the traffic recorded at Paris CDG (72.2 million passengers last year). The eleven million passengers recorded at Lyon<\/strong> last year accounted for just 15.2% of Roissy hub traffic.<\/p>\n

By way of comparison, in a country as centralised as the UK, last year Manchester accounted for 35.2% of London Heathrow's traffic (80.1 million passengers), while Edinburgh and Birmingham were in third place with just over 17%.<\/p>\n

If we take German airport traffic as an example, Munich<\/strong> generates the equivalent of 66.5% of the total traffic of Frankfurt<\/strong> while D\u00fcsseldorf<\/strong>which is number 3 in terms of passenger numbers, represents 35% of Frankfurt with its 23.5 million passengers.<\/p>\n

So there is certainly potential for a second major intercontinental airport outside Paris, as France is not so unique compared to its neighbours. Ideally, it would be Lyon<\/strong> which is the best positioned of all the regional airports. The hub is centrally located, just over an hour by TGV from the Mediterranean, an hour from the Alps and Switzerland, and two hours from Paris. The airport benefits from exemplary infrastructure, with its integrated TGV station and motorway network. Above all Lyon Saint-Exup\u00e9ry<\/strong> serves France's second-largest economic centre and the country's second-largest urban area. This strength is not reflected in the airport's current network.<\/p>\n

\n\t
\n\t\t
\n\t\t\t