EUROCONTROL
Medium-Term Forecast
Flight Movements
2010 – 2016
EUROCONTROL Medium-Term Forecast: IFR Flight Movements 2010-2016
Page i Released Issue Edition Number: v1.0
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
This report presents the February 2010 update of the EUROCONTROL Medium-Term
Forecast. The forecast considers the development of air traffic in Europe over the next 7
years.
Europe1 is forecast to have 11.5 million IFR flights in 2016, 22% more than in 2009. The
recent downturn results in four ‘lost’ years of growth, i.e. the 2008 annual peak in flights will
not be passed until 2012.
Ignoring the leap-year effect in 2012, after weak growth in 2010 the traffic growth for Europe
will remain fairly stable at around 3% per year from 2011. This growth rate remains
nevertheless below the long-term historical average of 3.8%-4%.
In percentage terms, traffic growth will be stronger for most of the States in Eastern Europe
(Figure 1). However in terms of number of additional flights the main contributors will be
Turkey and the busiest States of Western Europe (France, Germany, Italy see Figure 12 on
page 8). Details of growth per State are provided in annexes.
Figure 1. Average annual growth 2010-2016 for each State.
The forecast traffic growth is still strongly affected by the World economic downturn which
started in 2008. With fewer goods to ship and lower demand for air travel, especially in the
premium category; aircraft operators had to cut capacities and to implement cost-reduction
1 ‘Europe’ is represented by the EUROCONTROL Statistical Reference Area (ESRA) see Annex B.
EUROCONTROL Medium-Term Forecast: IFR Flight Movements 2010-2016
Page ii Released Issue Edition: v1.0
measures to survive. All but a few States in Europe saw a decrease in traffic in 2009, with
the European traffic drop being the deepest on records. All market segments contracted
during the year. Low-cost and business aviation nevertheless recovered at the very end of
the year. Load factors decreased during the first half of the year but came back to prerecession
levels in the second half. Oil prices, if low at the beginning of the year, increased to
$80 per barrel, putting additional pressure on operators. All of these effects will result in a low
traffic growth in 2010.
This forecast uses airport capacity figures based on the Challenges of Growth 2008 inputs,
refined with data from the STATFOR User Group. Lower levels of traffic reduce the impact of
airport constraints to a total of 119,000 IFR departures in 2016 (1% off total growth over 7
years).
Aviation should join the EU Emission Trading Scheme (ETS) from 2012. Because of the
recent downturn in traffic (4 years of lost traffic growth) and because aviation has already
responded in anticipation of ETS with flight efficiency measures, the impact of this new
regulatory measure on traffic growth is estimated to be very limited by 2016, though
additional risks that this brings are discussed in section 3.2.
Continuing improvements to the high-speed train network reduce growth by about 61,000
flights (0.5%) in total over 7 years, little changed from last year’s forecast. Lisbon FIR, Spain
and Italy see the largest percentage reductions, about 5%, 3.7% and 1.3% respectively.
Figure 2. Summary of the forecast for the ESRA082.
2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016
AAGR
2016/
2009
H . . . . . 9,722 10,080 10,592 11,015 11,469 11,940 12,413 4.0%
B 9,218 9,561 10,043 10,083 9,413 9,487 9,785 10,146 10,461 10,803 11,131 11,453 2.8%
IFR Flight Movements
(Thousands)
L . . . . . 9,224 9,379 9,619 9,825 10,056 10,282 10,502 1.6%
H . . . . . 3.3% 3.7% 5.1% 4.0% 4.1% 4.1% 4.0% 4.0%
B . 3.7% 5.0% 0.4% -6.6% 0.8% 3.2% 3.7% 3.1% 3.3% 3.0% 2.9% 2.8%
Annual Growth
(compared to previous
years)
L . . . . . -2.0% 1.7% 2.6% 2.1% 2.3% 2.3% 2.1% 1.6%
The EUROCONTROL Medium-Term Forecast (MTF) results are fully aligned with those of
the short-term forecast (first two years outlook). This document replaces the Short-Term
Forecast report previously published separately in February.
Any user of the forecast is strongly advised to use the forecast range (low-growth to highgrowth)
as an indicator of risk. By 2016, the high-growth scenario has nearly 1 million more
flights compared to the base-scenario (+8%); the low-growth scenario has slightly less than
1 million fewer movements (-8%). There are also a number of other important risks that this
forecast has not included. In particular, the delicate economic situation on both sides of the
Atlantic and the possibility of a future return to high oil prices present further down-side risks.
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