Bringing Life to Liepāja Airport

Liepāja airport saw a start of scheduled airBaltic flights in 2007 to Riga, later also to Hamburg and Copenhagen yet already in 2008 all of the routes were dropped. Also Russian Atlant-Soyuz Airlines offered short-lived service to Moscow Vnukovo between 2008 and 2009. This failure on sustaining flights is mainly due the superiority of Palanga airport located about 60km south of Liepāja. Palanga airport have better facilities and – even more important – better catchment area. Palanga itself is a seaside resort and the airport is easily accessible from Klaipeda city in south, Liepāja in north and a number of mid-sized towns in east. airBaltic actually switched Liepāja feeder route to Palanga in 2009 regardless of the existing SAS feeder route to Copenhagen, Norwegian service to Oslo and seasonal UTair link to Moscow. Is there any chance of attracting some services – at least a feeder route to BT hub in Riga? I think – yes. The main idea is to develop the airport as a true city airport with fast connections to all districts of the city and full integration in the transport grid.

The Key – a BRT line from Liepāja to Grobiņa

Grobiņa is the biggest suburban town near Liepāja just about 10km from the CBD. Currently a twice-hourly bus service is the main public transport link between Liepāja and Grobiņa and it runs on the highway by-passing Liepāja airport. My point is that building a 4km brand-new Bus Rapid Transit line and upgrading a number of other roads and streets would allow to substantially speed-up Liepāja-Grobiņa bus service. A secondary effect from this BRT would be notably improved connectivity of Liepāja airport as the station can be built right next to the passenger terminal. The completely new road section for the BRT must be built trough reedy wetlands on the northern side of Lake Liepāja so some environmental concerns may rise but, as this road is dedicated for buses, cyclists and pedestrians, the impacts can be hold under control. This routing also bypasses urban areas so the actual operating speed for vehicles will be higher.

Gateway for Cars and Bicycles

Usually airports are surrounded by Park&Fly car parks but they are not used (at least I haven’t came across) like Park&Ride sites. In the case of Liepāja a win-win situation can be created if those booth facilities are merged. P&R will be based on BRT and the increasing traffic will bringing even better connections to airport. For successful implementation of P&R system some push-back actions like big parking fees in CBD or congestion tax may be applied. The same parking lots can be used for P&R and P&F so more effective use and bigger turnarounds will lower the parking prices.

A cycle line can be built along the BRT line so connecting Grobiņa to Liepāja and also airport to Liepāja. Booth air and road visitors can be easily served by one bicycle rent in the airport and  - cycling used to reach the golden beaches and lively clubs.

The biggest advantage of the listed measures is that ground transport system will be fully independent from level of air traffic which is designed to be more re-active. I believe - if the scheme is realized – a stable air traffic will came back to serve Liepāja from city's closest and the most convenient airport.

A Rescue Plan for Estonian Air

Estonian Air fleet consist of two B737-500 and two 737-300. The two Saab 340 props are operated by subsidiary Estonian Air Regional. While industry’s average passenger drop in 2009 is forecasted at 3.1% Estonian air passenger figures in October shrunk by massive 31.9 %. The main reason for such a dramatic drop is cuts on frequencies with caused fewer passengers and even more cuts again. Even the new routes (to increase the aircraft utilization) are opened on low frequencies. As a result Amsterdam and Brussels are served only three times a week; Moscow, Kiev, London, Munich only twice weekly. No service to Paris and Berlin will be provided during week examined (January 11-17, 2010). Reasonably served B737 middle-range destinations are Copenhagen (19x weekly), Stockholm (10x weekly + more flights by Estonian Air Regional) and Oslo (5x weekly).

Although the fleet was cut this year - the aircraft utilization stands only at 57% - with means one plane is still odd.
The management always refers to low passenger demand and hopes for arrival of the new CRJ900NG whose smaller capacity and economics will allow operating more frequently.

Instead of cutting capacities I advise to expand the market. Riga airport on therouteshop.com has announced lack of five weekly flights from Riga to Paris. Estonian Air from Tallinn could pick up passengers at Riga organizing the route TLL-RIX-CDG(or even better ORY)-RIX-TLL. airBaltic is concentrating on mid-day flights to Western destinations and we see less and less evening and morning departures from Riga to Brussels and since KLM left – no evening and morning flights to Amsterdam. This mean Riga have a gap in market for time-sensitive passengers to Brussels and Amsterdam and Estonian air could cover it.
It would be a bad idea for Estonian air to enter Riga-London (daily by airBaltic, 2x daily by Ryanair and coming 3x weekly by Wizz Air) and Riga-Berlin (up to 3x daily airBaltic) so planes to London and Berlin may stop at Palanga. Palanga-London is highly attractive route with no direct competition. Palanga – Berlin is bit less attractive but - although slower than London - would gain passengers.

The aircraft utilization would be: 1st to Copenhagen in morning, Berlin in midday, Copenhagen in evening; 2nd to Stockholm in morning, Oslo or Moscow in midday, Stockholm in evening; 3rd to Brussels and Paris (time of day depending on Brussels); 4th to Amsterdam and London (time of day depending on Amsterdam).
Such routing would decrease demand on Copenhagen so no midday flight needed. Munich, Kiev and other low frequency destinations most probably must be dropped.