Article citation information:

Szabo, S, Pilát, M., Tobisová, A., Makó, S. Operational statistics of Kosice Airport. Scientific Journal of Silesian University of Technology. Series Transport. 2019, 102, 197-203. ISSN: 0209-3324. DOI: https://doi.org/10.20858/sjsutst.2019.102.16.

 

 

Stanislav SZABO[1], Marek PILÁT[2], Alica TOBISOVÁ[3], Sebastián MAKÓ[4]

 

 

 

OPERATIONAL STATISTICS OF KOSICE AIRPORT

 

Summary. The main aim of the article is to bring the understanding of operational statistics of airports closer to readers. What is the essence of the execution and what belongs to them. For this article, we chose the Airport Kosice and present its operational statistics in a specific year. In the introduction are some business companies at the airport as well as the airport itself. The number of transported passengers as one of the most basic airport operation services is dealt with in the scheduled and non scheduled passenger transport for the chosen year. Finally, it is connected to the global overtaking operations of Kosice Airport. All of these indicators are graphically displayed for easier comprehension for the reader, the portions of the transported passengers for each selected transport segment.

Keywords: operational statistics, airport, scheduled and non-scheduled passengers


1. INTRODUCTION

 

Monitoring the operational statistics is based on the overall productivity and performance of the airport. The main aim is to increase performance and revenue and reduce company costs.

The number of transported passengers, the number of take-offs and landings and the land movements of the aircraft all determine the operating performance of the airports. The number of these indicators is reflected in the total revenue which translates into the company’s profit. These indicators are monitored for airline passengers departing from the airport and transfer passengers. A more specific indicator may be used for passengers on scheduled flights, charter flights or classic and low-cost airlines. Several authors have dealt with this subject and have pointed out that it is an issue in the performance evaluation of international airports in the region of East Asia by Chang et. al. In this research, the hierarchical structure of evaluating airport performance evaluation problem will be constructed based on four aspects: supply, airline demand, passenger demand and management side [12]. In the commercial performance of global airports, Fuerst et al. stated that the revenues from non-aeronautical business have received increasing attention from airports seeking to enhance their profitability [13]. Malavolti talked about State Aids granted by regional airports: a two-sided market analysis and there is a lot of cases had risen in the past decade about agreements between regional airports and low-cost carriers [14]. Dynamically interdependent business model for airline airport coexistence by Minato et. al. observed that the load factor guaranteed a dynamically interdependent business model for airline-airport coexistence where an airline and an airport agree on the load factor of a flight, after which either party compensates for any discrepancies between the actual and the agreed-upon load factor [15]. Kratudnak et. al. in the paper “Analysis of key factors for airport service quality: A case study of three regional airports in Thailand” commented that airports open their doors to visitors and investors from around the world crucially boosting the economy, trade, investment, and tourism of countries throughout the world [16].

 

 

2. SPECIFIC INFORMATION ABOUT AIRPORT AND AIRLINE COMPANIES

 

Kosice Airport history was basically a military airport until 1910. Today, it is an international airport with a market share of 66% for Vienna airport and 34% for the Department of Transportation SR. Airport capacity is differentiated for 800,000 passengers per year. Passengers can get to over 500 destinations around the world with one transfer from Vienna, Warsaw, Prague and Istanbul. [1] [2]

Wizz Air is a low-cost carrier Hungarian company founded in 2003. The first aircraft took off from Katowice in 2004 and currently, it has 600 lines with 25 bases. As of August 2018, the company transported 3,476,091 passengers around the world. [3] [4]

Czech Airlines have its main base in Prague founded in 1923 offering a classic transport product. Travel Service is current a major shareholder (97.735%) with the rest of the share owned by Česká poisťovňa (2.265%). The latest passenger data is 2,900,590 from 2017. [5]

Austrian Airlines is a part of the Lufthansa Group covering approximately 130 destinations in Central and Eastern Europe. The company’s history dates back to 1918, however, the company was officially founded in 1957 and took off for the first time in 1958. The company has 83 aircraft with a base at Schwechat Airport in Vienna. The best year for Austrian Airlines was 2017 when 12.9 million passengers travelled around the world using the airline. [6] [7]

LOT Polish Airlines classic airline established in 1929, currently operates 73 aircraft. The main hub is Warsaw Chopin Airport and the approximate number of transported passengers per year is 7 million. [8] [9]

Turkish Airlines founded in 1933 with a vision to operate more than 500 aircraft for passenger and cargo transportation by 2023. The company has 78 aircraft available and operates over 304 destinations in 122 countries. As of April 2018, the company has transported 23 million passengers. A point of interest to note in 2017 is Turkish Airlines which transported 68,616,740 passengers all over the world. [10]

Travel Service is the largest Czech airline operating under the SmartWings trademark scheduled charter and business flights. The company also collaborates on aircraft leasing with companies such as Air Explore (AXE) and Go2Sky. The foundation of the company was established in 1997 and it has transported more than 7 million passengers in 2017. [11]

 

 

3. OPERATIONAL STATISTICS FOR THE YEAR 2017

 

The chosen year of 2017 for this article recorded 436,696 passengers transported by Kosice airport, an increase of 6.39% over the previous year. The largest increase in passengers was recorded in the scheduled transportation segment with an increase of up to 18.85 %. This year recorded 9,367 aircraft movements (+ 11.17%) the most pronounced decline in percentage terms belongs to cargo transport at 65.06%. [2]

 

3.1 Scheduled passenger transport

 

Scheduled passenger transport was operated by five airlines to destinations with scheduled departure time. These destinations include; Bratislava, Prague, Vienna, London, Istanbul and Warsaw. Figure 1 is the percentage impression of each airline's share of scheduled transportation for the selected year. The largest share of passengers belongs to the low-cost company, Wizz Air with 57.7%. The second place belongs to Czech Airlines with a percentage of 20.6% on scheduled flights. In the current year, Austrian Airlines carried 15.5% of passengers en route from Košice to Vienna. LOT Polish Airlines contributed 4.3% and Turkish Airlines 1.9% where it should be recalled that Turkish Airlines flew from Košice until June 2016. It is possible to understand the percentage of Turkish Airlines for the half year at 1.9% which is really a good number for a newly established route from Kosice to Istanbul. [2]

Table 1 listed below shows the number of passengers transported with airlines concerned at the Kosice airport. [2]

 

Tab. 1

Transported passengers on scheduled flights.

Airline

Number of transported passengers

Wizz Air

201,366

LOT Polish Airlines

14,997

Turkish Airlines

6,485

Czech Airlines

71,987

Austrian Airlines

54,144

 

Fig. 1. Scheduled transport for the chosen year 2017

 

The largest number of passengers was transported by the low-cost airline, Wizz Air (201,366) and the least transported by Turkish Airlines (6,485). For Turkish Airlines this average number is due to the later start of operations at the airport compared to other airlines. [2]

 

3.2 Non Scheduled passenger transport

 

Kosice Airport due to the global predicament and crisis in Turkey had a significant drop in the number of passengers carried on chartered flights. The year on year decline was 25% which represents the worst balance for the summer season during the last ten years. The largest share of passengers that travelled with airline Smart Wings was 43.78%, while Travel Service was 39.14%. Third place belongs to the Bulgarian Air Charter with 7.23% transported passengers. [2]

In table 2 are the percentages of visited destinations for the selected year. As you can see the largest number of passengers was transported to Bulgaria (34.1%) and the least to favourite destinations of previous years, Egypt and Israel (0%). Croatia had the smallest non-zero number (0.9%). Kosice Airport has tried to prolong the charter season in spite of unfavourable conditions but has failed without success. This is due to the fact that the summer season starts from June to mid-September which is a very short time for the summer season and non-scheduled flights. Travel agencies work on the principle of limiting business risks as much as possible. The summer season has been shortened due to product demand forecasts of weak competition in the market and absence of a year- round offer of at least one holiday destination and a number of other factors that have significantly affected the selected summer season. [2]


Tab. 2

Non-Scheduled passengers.

 

3.3 Global operational statistics

 

In the global scale, low-cost charter scheduled and general aviation flights were involved in the operating performance. The detailed share is shown in figure 2 which is expressed per percentage point for each factor contributing to the overall airport operating performance. [2]

 

Bez názvu

 

Fig. 2. Global operational statistic segments

 

The largest percentage in the global operating performance was the low-cost transport (46.1%), second place to scheduled transport (33.8%), third place (19.7%) for charter passengers and last general aviation terminal with 0.4%. [2]

 

4. CONCLUSION

 

The main aim of this article was to point out the operational statistics of Kosice Airport for the selected year 2017. As can be seen, the largest proportion of passengers transported by Wizz Air low-cost airline is worth up to 58% of total scheduled flights. The second place has Czech Airlines with 21%, Austrian Airlines with 15%, LOT Polish Airlines with 4% and Turkish Airlines with 2%. On the global scale, this meant 46.1% for low-cost, 19.7% for charter flights, 33.8% for scheduled flights and 0.4% for General Aviation Terminal. Burgas in Bulgaria and Greek destinations such as Heraklion or Rhodes was the most visited destinations in the non-scheduled perspective. The chosen year of 2017 had a record number of passengers transported close to almost half a million per year which is a very positive figure for a small international airport.

 

 

References

 

1.        Airport Kosice a.s. Official website. Available at: https://www.airportkosice.sk

2.        Internal materials.

3.        Wizzair statistics. Official website. Available at: https://corporate.wizzair.com/en-GB/investor_relations/traffic_statistics.

4.        Wizzair. Official website. Available at: https://wizzair.com.

5.        Czech Airlines. Official website. Available at: https://www.csa.cz/cz-en/about-us/.

6.        Austrian Airlines. Official website. Available at: https://www.austrian.com.

7.        Traffic Results for the Entire Year 2017: Record Year with 12.8 Percent Growth in Passenger Volume. Press Corner 2018. Available at: https://www.austrianairlines.ag/Press/PressReleases/Press/2018/01/002.aspx?sc_lang=en&mode=%7B309_3.

8.        LOT Polish Airlines. Official website. Available at: https://corporate.lot.com/pl/en/.

9.        Star Aliance Member Airline. Official website. Available at: https://www.staralliance.com/en/member-airline-details?airlineCode=LO.

10.    Turkish Airlines. Official website. Available at: https//www.turkishairlines.com.

11.    Travel service. Official website. Available at: https://www.travelservice.aero/o-spolecnosti/.

12.    Chang Y.H. et. al. “Performance evaluation of International Airports in the region of East Asia. Eastern Asia Soc Transport At Studies.

13.    Fuerst Franz et. al. “The commercial performance of global airports. Transport Policy 61: 123-131.

14.    Malavolti Estelle et. al. 2017. “State Aids granted by regional airports: a two-sided market analysis”. 14th World Conference on Transport Research (WCTR).

15.    Minato N. et. al. 2017. „Dynamically interdependent business model for airline airport coexistence. Journal of Air Transport Management 64, Part B:161-172.

16.    Kratudnak S. et. al. “Analysis of key factors for airport service quality: A case study of three regional airports in Thailand”. International Conference on Industrial Engineering and Operations Management. Bandung, Indonesia, March 6-8, 2018.

 

 

Received 18.11.2018; accepted in revised form 15.02.2019

 

 

Scientific Journal of Silesian University of Technology. Series Transport is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License



[1] Faculty of Aeronautics, The Technical University of Košice, Rampová 7 Street, 04121 Košice,
Slovak Republic. Email: stanislav.szabo@tuke.sk

[2] Faculty of Aeronautics, The Technical University of Košice, Rampová 7 Street, 04121 Košice,
Slovak Republic. Email: marek.pilat@tuke.sk

[3] Faculty of Aeronautics, The Technical University of Košice, Rampová 7 Street, 04121 Košice,
Slovak Republic. Email: alica.tobisova@tuke.sk

[4] Faculty of Aeronautics, The Technical University of Košice, Rampová 7 Street, 04121 Košice,
Slovak Republic. Email: sebastian.mako@tuke.sk