Whereas all over the world the number of airplane passengers grows, it declines in Prague, at least during January 2011. However, the cargo transport did well during the period.
Prague Airport has had a rather bad start this year. The airport web site announced that despite the positive results of most of the airports around the world, the number of passengers going through Prague airport dropped by almost five per cent during January.
Czech daily Idnes.cz reported that only 658 thousand passengers used the airport in January, which is a 4.6 per cent decline compared to the data from 2010. Naturally, the planes are emptier and the traffic is dropping a little as a result. Most of the passengers in January flew from Prague to Paris. The next most visited cities were Moscow and Frankfurt.
Nevertheless, cargo transport recorded an increase at the beginning of 2011 as around 40 per cent more goods was transported than in the same period of 2010. This makes the performance of Prague airport unique and differentiates it from the global trend. According to the statistics of International Airport Council, the global air traffic increased by more than 7 per cent in January and by 8 per cent in the whole Europe. The closest Prague competitors are doing quite well. Vienna recorded a 6.7 per cent increase and Munich even a 19.5 per cent increase in the number of flights in January.
According to the spokesperson of Prague airport, the results were not surprising. The prognosis had shown that the number of passengers would decrease by four per cent in the first quarter of 2011 and would start rising again at the beginning of April. The whole year should bring a 3 per cent growth. The spokesperson also claimed the reason of the decline is the reduction of the less profitable flights.