SA Passenger Stats [Archive]

grjplanes

January 18th, 2011, 11:05 AM

This season (Nov'10-Mar'11) in comparison to last season (Nov'09-Mar'10) is very much the same at CPT:
SAA flights to LHR is operated with the same aircraft (A342), same frequency.
Virgin operating daily with A340-600 over Dec/Jan, infact for Nov,Feb and Mar they're operating 5 instead of 4 weekly.
Lufthansa is daily but with 747-400, last year was A340-600, so small capacity increase.
KLM is still daily with same aircraft, 777-200ER
BA again operating 13x weekly, 7x 744 and 6x 772.
LTU I think is operating 2x weekly instead of 3x.
So no major differences.

For next season (Nov'11-Mar'12) there is already a few changes notable:
BA seems to be planning 13x weekly again, but all 747-400, changing the 2nd flight back to a daylight return, departing CPT around 08:00am
SAA ofcourse bringing in the A330-200, so slight capacity decrease.
Virgin plans to start services middle-October, about 2 weeks earlier with A340-300 3x weekly, November with A340-600 5x and Dec/Jan daily.

dysan1

January 18th, 2011, 11:42 AM

If many flights to CT from Europe or other long haul destinations are "full" or "packed" does this mean they are using fewer planes or flights or that there is more demand?

Surely not all airlines have to use all the "slots" or "spots" allocated to them but at the same time would they rather not run 1 full plane than 2 half empty planes?

Or is the fact that flights are booked or made available well in advance a means of preventing this?

I know domestically, it seems that at times flights are just delayed for an hour or so, so that 1 plane is used rather than the two scheduled flights.

We will soon see as the December ACSA figures should be available this week.

November was bad for Cape Town on the international front with -2,7% decline. Here's hoping the reports of December improvement by the press are in fact true, but then again the hotels did say the first two weeks of Dec trade were poor.

It seems though that all 3 of our main airports will have a good December.

Mo Rush

January 18th, 2011, 12:01 PM

Its just that quite a few people on different flights from Europe say that quite a few flights are fully booked.

This may not translate into giant increases but 100% sold is better than 85% or 70%.

GregPz

January 25th, 2011, 10:20 AM

Cape Town 763 192 pax in December up 3.7% (domestic +5.2%, intl -2.1%).
Total for the year 8 107 727 +5.0% (dom +5.9%, intl -1.15).

dysan1

January 25th, 2011, 05:34 PM

^^ so the continued trend of international declines at Cape Town. -2.1% is quite large. The domestic growth looks rather healthy, but best seen in the light of how Durban and Joburg do - when we get those figures.

However if you pick the stats apart...

December was the best ever December for passenger numbers through Cape Town and the 4th best month ever for domestic passengers (with October being the 3rd best ever). So the only concern is continual international decline.

See that ACSA still dont have other cities up yet, only aircraft movements.

Mo Rush

January 25th, 2011, 05:39 PM

dysan1

January 25th, 2011, 05:41 PM

^^ Well lets see how this affects Joburg

Mo Rush

January 25th, 2011, 05:49 PM

Deon Cloete stated today International was flat, with the drop due to the European Chaos. Rise in domestic was good news, with good domestic activity during WC as per his World Cup report.

He also mentioned in workshop more direct flights from Turkey soon and more in pipeline.
Runway reconfiguration for CTIA in 5 year plan but on hold.

grjplanes

January 25th, 2011, 08:15 PM

Turkish Airlines started their additional 5th weekly flight yesterday, Mondays in SA, both JNB and CPT. Remember for the airlines this still means direct, even if not nonstop. But as TK grows the route and being one of the fastest growing airlines worldwide I wouldn't be surprised if they're to split JNB and CPT at a later stage.
Surely if it wasn't for the lots of cancelled European (mostly LHR) flights CPT would have shown growth internationally. Many people eventually had to cancel their trips, this could even have affected travellers via Dubai and Istanbul as well.
JNB might still have a growth, because it still had several other flights/airlines which it didn't have the previous December, ie: Thai, Jet, VAus.

GregPz

February 4th, 2011, 08:55 AM

Seems ACSA is only going to release December stats in the mid Feb - apparently JNB pax figures haven't been finalised and nothing futher will be released until that's done, yet strangely stats were submitted to ACI. Anyway based on what we know the stats for JNB and DUR will look pretty much like this:

JNB
Dec: 1 673 800 pax +6.1%
2010 Total: 18.39m +5.4%

DUR
Dec: 445 350 pax +11.5%
2010 Total: 4.75m +10.5%

What's particularly impressive about the 11.5% growth at DUR in Dec is that it's on the back of an 11.3% increase in Dec 2009 meaning Dec traffic has increased by 24.1% in 2 years, compared with 7.5% for CPT and 10.4% for JNB.

dysan1

February 4th, 2011, 09:59 AM

^^ that December figure must surely be the highest ever monthly figure for Durban. I have never seen anything over 440000 before for the city, even at the height of the boom a few years ago! That is mighty impressive.

I gather from this, it is showing that the Durban - Joburg leg is closing up on the importance of the Joburg-Cape Town leg, as i would imagine the vast majority of the Durban growth is Joburg focussed (lanseria included).

dysan1

February 4th, 2011, 05:35 PM

Ok i checked up. So the highest monthly total in Durban previously was 429203. If the number reported above is correct it is 15,000 higher than ever before in one month. It will also be 40,000 higher than the previous highest December figure.

Additionally this December would be 90000 higher than December 2008 and 45,000 higher than last December.

Very good going if it is the correct figure!! And clearly shows we are well turned around and out of the airline dip - we are actually in a way better position from a passenger point than we have ever been.

grjplanes

February 5th, 2011, 09:09 AM

I gather from this, it is showing that the Durban - Joburg leg is closing up on the importance of the Joburg-Cape Town leg, as i would imagine the vast majority of the Durban growth is Joburg focussed (lanseria included).

I wouldn't really say that the Joburg-DUR sector is fast closing in on Joburg-CPT, maybe slowly slightly. Remember that the Kulula flights from Lanseria to DUR is mostly flights that's just been switched from JNB to HLA, while Kulula's flights on HLA-CPT is mostly additional while not really removing much from JNB.
Capacity on CPT-DUR is infact more than the previous December, even after SAA's withdrawel, with the 1 extra Mango flight, 1 extra BA flight and 2 extra daily 1Time flights (which was started in March '10).
Also keep in mind that the Airlink routes was badly affected with problems the previous December, this impacted on DUR-GRJ, DUR-BFN, DUR-MQP and DUR-MPM.

dysan1

February 5th, 2011, 04:28 PM

I never said fast closing, but closing it is.

If we look at absolute growth levels in each of the cities in 2010 it is as follows:

Joburg: 942,182 extra people
Cape Town: 385,904 extra people
Durban: 451,357 extra people

Therefore Durban closed the gap by 65,453 people. If the growth in Cape Town is low, then this Durban growth must surely be coming predominently from Joburg? Unless some of the regional routes are starting to see strong growth from Durban. Yes 65k is a rather small number in the big scheme of things.

Secondly you mentioned airlink badly affected last December? yet growth then was still good. To be over 90,000 up on December 2008 is nothing small. Cape town is 50,000 up from Dec 2008 and Joburg 160,000 up - these are airports far bigger than Durban.

GregPz

February 11th, 2011, 10:41 AM

It makes sense that virtually all the growth at DUR will be on the JNB route as one has to fly via JNB to go just about anywhere in the world. At least 80% of my flights to JNB are just stop overs.

GregPz

February 11th, 2011, 10:47 AM

December stats have finally been released. JNB exceeded 800k international pax for the first time!

http://www.freeimagehosting.net/uploads/276d489061.jpg (http://www.freeimagehosting.net/)

And the year end figures for 2010. Not a bad year overall and definitely signs that things are picking up. We can expect good growth if Velvet Sky launches.

http://www.freeimagehosting.net/uploads/cdf9739384.jpg (http://www.freeimagehosting.net/)

grjplanes

February 11th, 2011, 10:48 AM

I noticed some of the December stats is on the ACSA site, most showing growth. Interesting to note that DUR International was actually down from last December...I think mostly to do with Air Mauritius having this time around only 2 or 3 weekly flights all with A319, last season they had weeks where they had up to 4 or 5 weekly flights on MRU-DUR, some with A340 and A330.

Regarding the discussion of growth at DUR vs JNB vs CPT, I believe it's actually more important to see what growth HLA is having, while JNB itself is also showing growth overall and domestic, one would almost be certain that HLA is definitely showing much higher growth, and thus being the major driving force for growth at both DUR and CPT.

nomnolence

February 11th, 2011, 10:58 AM

Regarding the discussion of growth at DUR vs JNB vs CPT, I believe it's actually more important to see what growth HLA is having, while JNB itself is also showing growth overall and domestic, one would almost be certain that HLA is definitely showing much higher growth, and thus being the major driving force for growth at both DUR and CPT.

Lanseria weighs expansion options as passenger numbers swell (http://www.engineeringnews.co.za/article/airports-2011-02-04)
Passenger numbers at LIA reached more than one-million last year, up from around 150 000 in 2005.

“It could touch, or exceed, two-million passengers by the end of this year,” says LIA airport manager Gavin Sayc.

dysan1

February 11th, 2011, 11:47 AM

Yeah but still doesn't clear show what 2010 growth figures there were. I'd hazard in the 20s range. Disappointing on some negative on int in Durban, MRU most likely as emirates were packed. Its only about 550 people though. Int growth in Durban will remain flat until more capacity is available - Qatar....?

GregPz

February 12th, 2011, 09:03 AM

Here's the market share of pax traffic for ACSA airports with the figure for 5 years ago shown in brackets.

Domestic traffic
JNB 39.9% (42.9)
CPT 27.9% (26.4)
DUR 19.0% (17.4)
PLZ 5.9% (6.2)
ELS 2.8% (2.7)
GRJ 2.2% (2.8)
BFN 1.7% (1.2)
KIM 0.6% (0.5)

International traffic
JNB 84.7% (83.9)
CPT 13.6% (15.8)
DUR 1.7% (0.3)

Total Traffic
JNB 53.5% (54.7)
CPT 23.6% (23.3)
DUR 13.8% (12.5)
PLZ 4.1% (4.4)
ELS 2.0% (1.9)
GRJ 1.5% (2.0)
BFN 1.2% (0.9)
KIM 0.4% (0.3)

GregPz

February 12th, 2011, 09:13 AM

This shows how many pax each airport has gained over the last 5 years

JNB 2 625 144 +16.7% (Dom 772 268 +8.8%, Intl 1 704 471 +24.5%)
CPT 1 382 961 +20.6% (Dom 1 265 411 +23.4%, Intl 81 069 +6.2%)
DUR 1 158 196 +32.2% (Dom 986 197 +27.7%, Intl 151 447 +565.6%)
PLZ 141 065 +11.1%
ELS 114 025 +20.4%
GRJ -38 988 -6.9%
BFN 156 891 +63.6%
KIM 34 628 +35.3%

dysan1

February 12th, 2011, 10:10 AM

some very interesting stats there greg! interesting to note the declines in George... the only centre that is shrinking...reasons?

It also appears that the changes are mainly happening in the 3 main centres which would be expected. With Durban and to a lesser degree Cape Town gaining more overall share of the market at Joburgs expense.

grjplanes

February 12th, 2011, 01:52 PM

The major drops for George was from mid-2008 (after Nationwide collapse) untill early-mid 2010. During 2008 and 2009 drops were as bad as up to 15%. From last year it started turning again with at first lower month-on-month drops to at last some little growth, with now December the highest since. So it did start making up some losses and seems to be going the direction of modest growth and slowly building back to the levels of 2006/2007. Also keep in mind that growth between 2005 and 2007 was at some time very aggressive with even more than 20% growths some months.

So, most importantly, recession! Being probably the destination where leisure traffic makes up the largest part of it, this then gets much more affected during recessionary times. Then from Dec09 to May 2010 the slight drops was still the effect of the Airlink crash which at first had some flights dropped/suspended together with the uncertainty about Airlink from a pax perspective and ofcourse mainly the runway which got shut down with every drop of rain.

Things are looking better at the moment, I believe January will also have a good improvement. Kulula now has 1 more weekly flight than last year this time and using the larger 737-800s more often. 1Time also seems to be using their larger MD82 aircraft more often. Confidence seems to be back with Airlink, the DUR-GRJ route seems safe (last year Jan/Feb it was suspended for about 6 weeks) and CPT-GRJ is currently showing great performance with most flights showing good loads and once again Airlink now and then feel the need to upgrade the morning flight from 37-seat ERJ to 83-seat AR8. This coming week we'll also be seeing a phenomenom last seen in 2005, where extra flights is added outside of holiday periods, with SA Express to operate 5 extra flights Wed/Fri/Sun, most probably to do with the Outeniqua Wheelchair Marathon.

GregPz

February 12th, 2011, 02:51 PM

GregPz

February 12th, 2011, 02:53 PM

Kruger Mpumalanga Airport (Nelspruit) showing very good growth:

December: 19 998 pax +16.8%

2010 Total: 239 292 +14.6%

January 2011: 17 716 +30.1%

dysan1

February 12th, 2011, 02:56 PM

dysan1

February 13th, 2011, 08:27 PM

Greg, do we have details on the number of flights between city pairs in SA per week? i.e. Dur-Cpt etc...

grjplanes

February 14th, 2011, 03:15 PM

If SA Express took over the DUR-GRJ route I'm sure it would encourage growth. It's primarily a leisure route and currently too expensive with Airlink's jetstream aircraft. Most people heading to the Garden Route from Durban fly to CPT then hire a car.

Those who are determined enough to go... i for one could not be bothered with the current prices and dont even include it my potential visitation list, unless i was prepared to drive down from Durban

It's suppose to be primarily a leisure route, but at these prices it isn't and mostly get used by the limited amount of business travellers. Only over holiday periods the leisure side that can afford it increases. Although not operated by Jetstream aircraft (luckily not!), but the Embraer RJ, it still makes it uneconomical to charge lower prices throughout. And room for expansion/growth is limited due to the big gap in Airlink's fleet between the 37-seat ERJ and 83-seat AR8.
Thus I agree, if no other competitor can enter the market yet, it could be better if SA Express is to take it over and use the 50-seat CRJ. Although still not the best economical aircraft, it would leave room open for slightly lower fares and still they have 70-seat aircraft that can be used as substitute for higher demand periods.

Currently there is special fares of between R500-R550 one-way for travel up to 6 March (although I believe very little of these are left) and also again between 1 May and 15 June. So they are trying to give the route a boost in the quieter periods, and take the financial knock then, while making up over busier periods.

GregPz

February 17th, 2011, 03:22 PM

In 2010 JNB moved up 2 places on the global ranking to 74th busiest. It overtook Washngton (DCA), Dublin and Manchester and was overtaken by Moscow (SVO).

CPT moved down from 171 to the 176th spot. It overtook Dallas-Love Field but was overtaken by St Petersburg, Zhengzhou, Urumqi, Istanbul-Sabiha Gökçen, Hurghada and Sharm el Sheikh.

DUR moved up 267 to 264th. It overtook Palermo, Newcastle, Belfast, Rome-Ciampino, Burbank, Providence and East Midlands. It was overtaken by Bucharest, Campinas, Fortaleza, Brussels-Charleroi.

With the strong growth at the Red Sea airports it also means for the first time in many years CPT in no longer 3rd in Africa but now 5th.

GregPz

February 22nd, 2011, 11:43 AM

Here's traffic figures for January. Excellent results for DUR!

http://www.freeimagehosting.net/uploads/8e88170ee9.jpg (http://www.freeimagehosting.net/)

And the totals for the last 12 months

http://www.freeimagehosting.net/uploads/23347d0ed3.jpg (http://www.freeimagehosting.net/)

romanSA

February 22nd, 2011, 02:25 PM

Thanks for posting. I think, thjough, that the second table should be Feb '10 - Jan '11 (not Feb '10 - Jan '10).

GregPz

February 22nd, 2011, 03:20 PM

Changed it.

GregPz

February 22nd, 2011, 03:54 PM

I've also updated the December figures with the final stats for DUR.
http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showpost.php?p=72424593&postcount=33

dysan1

February 22nd, 2011, 07:14 PM

17% is a massive month for Durbs. come on with the extra international flights

Switch

February 23rd, 2011, 06:29 AM

romanSA

February 23rd, 2011, 07:16 AM

I've also updated the December figures with the final stats for DUR.
http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showpost.php?p=72424593&postcount=33

I think that table should read Dec '10, not Dec '11, unless you can see into the future. :)

grjplanes

February 23rd, 2011, 08:31 AM

Okay I need some help here with the international figures for Durban.
If emirates fly every day of the week... that is 365 flights with 278 seats which give a total of 101470 passengers for the year.

Mauritius fly twice a week... that is 104 flights with 275 seats which give you a total of 28600.

Airlink have 156 flights with 29 seats which give you a total of 4611

If you add them you get: 134 681

Where did the other 45 000 come from?

The figures is arriving and departing pax added together.

Btw, the Air Mauritius flights is mostly done with A319 aircraft, I believe around 120 seats.

Airlink Maputo flights currently operate 5x weekly, will be back to 6x weekly from next week. So that's around 260 flights a year.

EK 365 flights @ 278 seats = 101 470 (one way) x 2 = 202 940
MK 104 flights @ 120 seats = 12 480 x 2 = 24 960
SA 260 flights @ 29 seats = 7 540 x 2 = 15 080

Total: 242 980 both ways
That gives you roughly a load factor of 74%

Ofcourse do keep in mind that Air Mauritius does sometimes operate a few extra flights and larger aircraft over holiday periods. Airlink's MPM flights did also fluctuate a lot the last year, between 4 and 6x weekly and mostly on public holidays it doesn't operate. Also the figure can also include some flights during the World Cup which was by other airlines as scheduled and not chartered.

Switch

February 23rd, 2011, 11:55 AM

Okay. That makes sense. Was trying to work out the load factor. That's not bad at 74% but could it sustain another international flight? I don't think so unless a flight from JHB moves to DUR, like a London flight...

GregPz

February 23rd, 2011, 02:55 PM

74% is above average so yes, it inidcates that it could sustain more international flights.

dysan1

February 23rd, 2011, 03:11 PM

also dont forget that the vast majority of international travellers still go through joburg because most people like to fly direct not via the desert.

GregPz

February 24th, 2011, 01:25 PM

Here's the change in the actual number of pax

Jan'11 (last 12 Months)

JNB 128 303 (1 056 861)________Dom 78 602 (435 871)__Intl 49 380 (546 687)

CPT 36 618 (412 856)__________Dom 37 766 (403 896)__Intl -1 255 (-15 871)

DUR 57 305 (485 773)__________Dom 55 944 (366 449)__Intl 859 (104 418)

PLZ 4 541 (75 997)

ELS 3 742 (2 702)

GRJ 3 698 (-15 023)

BFN 2 953 (11 186)

KIM -215 (940)

Note the domestic and intl figures don't add up to the total as they don't include unscheduled traffic.

GregPz

March 13th, 2011, 12:14 PM

Greg, do we have details on the number of flights between city pairs in SA per week? i.e. Dur-Cpt etc...

One way flight from OAG for the top 20 but frequecies (particularly JNB/GRJ) do vary seasonally.

1 CPT-JNB 307
2 DUR-JNB 216
3 CPT-DUR 93
4 JNB-PLZ 71
5 CPT-PLZ 65
6 BFN-JNB 54
7 DUR-PLZ 46
8 GRJ-JNB 45
9 ELS-JNB 38
=10 CPT-HLA (Lanseria) 37
=10 JNB-MQP (Nelspruit) 37
12 JNB-RCB (Richards Bay) 36
13 DUR-HLA 35
14 JNB-KIM 34
15 CPT-ELS 32
16 BFN-CPT 26
17 DUR-ELS 25
18 JNB-PZB (Pietermaritzburg) 24
19 CPT-GRJ 18
20 JNB-PTG (Polokwane) 15

GregPz

March 13th, 2011, 12:18 PM

More interestlingly here's the annual one way capacity for the top 20 routes from OAG. Note this is based on current capacity so for seasonal services this will vary.

1 CPT-JNB 2 530 000
2 DUR-JNB 1 617 500
3 CPT-DUR 615 500
4 JNB-PLZ 482 000
5 CPT-HLA 313 000
6 DUR-HLA 292 000
7 GRJ-JNB 271 500
8 CPT-PLZ 214 500
9 ELS-JNB 211 000
10 BFN-JNB 204 000
11 DUR-PLZ 138 500
12 JNB-MQP 129 500
13 BFN-CPT 94 500
14 JNB-RCB 94 000
15 JNB-KIM 88 500
16 CPT-ELS 85 000
17 JNB-PZB 67 500
18 DUR-ELS 52 000
19 CPT-GRJ 41 500
20 CPT-MQP 30 500

GregPz

March 13th, 2011, 05:58 PM

SAA no longer has the largest share of the domestic market at DUR but is still strong at JNB.

Share of domestic capacity:

JNB
SAA 34.5%
1Time 15.9%
BA 15.0%
Kulula 13.5%
SA Express 8.8%
Mango 8.2%
Airlink 3.9%

CPT
SAA 28.6%
Kulula 20.3%
1Time 14.7%
BA 14.5%
Mango 13.2%
SA Express 6.3%
Airlink 2.4%

DUR
Kulula 24.1%
SAA 19.9%
1Time 16.8%
Mango 15.3%
BA 12.2%
SA Express 6.1%
Airlink 2.2%

dysan1

March 13th, 2011, 09:39 PM

Thanks for all the great insights Greg! Will be interesting to see how the extra planes for Kulula alter this further

GregPz

March 17th, 2011, 05:15 PM

Good signs of growth at ACSA airports for Feb with double digit growth at DUR, GRJ and BFN!

http://img860.imageshack.us/img860/6812/acsamonthcopy.jpg (http://img860.imageshack.us/i/acsamonthcopy.jpg/)

http://img215.imageshack.us/img215/6993/acsayearcopy.jpg (http://img215.imageshack.us/i/acsayearcopy.jpg/)

juzzy

March 17th, 2011, 07:13 PM

still negative figures for DUR int'l flights though?

dysan1

April 17th, 2011, 07:32 PM

Not to jump on Greg's reporting, but it appears the Mar11 figures are out, here's a quick summary for the 3 main airports in anticipation of Greg's more detailed analysis.

Monthly change
Mar11 | Mar10 | % change

JHB - 1,665,879 | 1,541,563 | 8.1%
CPT - 773,929 | 763,347 | 1.4%
DBN - 423,680 | 408,244 | 3.8%

This was the best ever march for Durban.
This was the best month for Cape Town since March 2008.
Joburg had a steamroller of a month

Annual growth (Apr10 to Mar11 vs previous 12 months)
Current | Previous | % change

JHB - 18,711,569 | 17,596,203 | 6.3%
CPT - 8,200,938 | 7,819,069 | 5.1%
DBN - 4,870,729 | 4,403,340 | 10.6%

Durban is at highest annual passenger numbers ever - 80,000 better than 07/08.
Cape Town is 226,000 from its highest ever annual numbers.
Joburg is 550,000 away from its highestever annual numbers.

All of this good growth and Easter is end of April this year, which should give us fantastic April figures too, especially with the Emirates double daily settling in in Cape Town - no effect on international figures for March which were down on the year before and at their lowest march level since 05/06.

GregPz

April 18th, 2011, 03:45 PM

Thanks Mike, busy travelling through Turkey so didn't get around to it. Will be intersting to see what effect Velvet Sky has for April.

grjplanes

April 18th, 2011, 04:45 PM

I don't believe Velvet Sky specifically will have a great impact yet, but overall April should be performing extremely well due to it mostly being holiday.

Domestically would be impacted greatly due the Easter holiday (remember last year Easter was early 2-5 April, so some traffic would have fallen in March already then). Now the original April holiday fell mostly to April's side, plus the extra long-weekend coming up.
Internationally also some same reasons, but for CPT would impact due to many airlines extending extra flights till end-April as well as Emirates 2nd daily flight.
Regionally Air Namibia with it's introduction of more CPT-WVB and new JNB-WVB flights, as well as SAA using larger aircraft on JNB-WDH.

And ofcourse biggest reason concerning all of this...last year April was the big Ash-cloud over Europe which affected international traffic to South Africa together with connecting domestic and regional traffic.

Re the figures, I believe most of the domestic growth in March is driven by flights between these 3 major cities. When looking at the other airport's (ACSA) figures, which I hope GregPz will provide us later when possible, both PLZ and ELS seems to have dropped domestically in March, while GRJ stood bit stagnant. BFN had reasonable good growth, and KIM and Upington also showed good growth. Although GregPz doesn't show us Upington (because it's minimal), it is of note to say that Upington is the only airport now which is at it's highest ever, while most others is still below the peak years of 2005-2007.

Btw, there is a strange figure in JNB's unscheduled numbers, showing 75 000 pax arriving unscheduled (more than the 68000 during June with the World Cup). Also the international figures at JNB shows quite a dip, compared to the good figures the last couple of months...so I presume somewhere there's a mix-up regarding these two figures.

grjplanes

April 18th, 2011, 04:53 PM

More interestlingly here's the annual one way capacity for the top 20 routes from OAG. Note this is based on current capacity so for seasonal services this will vary.
19 CPT-GRJ 41 500

GregPz, do you maybe know how exactly do they go about getting these figures, special formula, or just what airlines provide them?
As the above figures for CPT-GRJ, which should be easily calculated as is only served by one airline and pretty much sticks to the same aircraft on the schedules, doesn't seem correct to me.
Simple modest calculation:

Airlink on the route:

13 x weekly flights with 37-seat ERJ135 aircraft = 481seats
6 x weekly flights with 83-seat AvroRJ83 aircraft = 498 seats

= 979 one-way weekly seats

x 52 weeks

= 50 908 seats.

And this is currently the lowest capacity on the route in the last 6 years!

dysan1

April 18th, 2011, 07:02 PM

Just a few corrections.

Durban is at highest ever figures too.

Cape Town in March fell 8000 people compared to march last year - it was a bad international showing, worst march since 2005. It needs April to be good on the international front.

Mo Rush

April 18th, 2011, 07:57 PM

March was pretty busy in Cape Town with all sorts of events, day after day. In fact I'd say its one of our best "March" ever

Airport stats are important but it puts into perspective that the vibe created with a cosistent stream of conferences, events, film shoots, government events, infectin the city, indaba, jazz fest etc. are as important

dysan1

April 18th, 2011, 10:48 PM

Great stuff. But this is a stats thread. The numbers say things were flat overall and well frankly with "so many events" on you would not have expected international decreases to that extent especially with the Emirates launch et al. Must have been more locals in attendance.

Maybe April will be magic.

Mo Rush

April 19th, 2011, 08:50 AM

As you say, this is a stats thread.

grjplanes

April 19th, 2011, 10:07 AM

Durban is at highest ever figures too.

That's correct, sorry my bad.

The overall figure is at it's highest yes, mainly due to the surge in international figures (driven by Emirates), but also the unscheduled market which was boosted by the World Cup.
Domestic is still lower than 06/07, and Regional ofcourse is totally dead!

Mo Rush

April 19th, 2011, 10:39 AM

Can we return to the stats being presented in the graphic or usual image?

Sand-Shark

April 19th, 2011, 11:37 AM

Just done an extrapolation for fun based on an annual growth of:

JHB 6%
CTN 5%
DBN 10%

Before I get shot down, I realise these rates will change and there are many reasons for the current situation. However, if you extrapolate based on existing numbers, DBN will overtake CTN in 12 years and JHB in 36 years time :)

GregPz

April 19th, 2011, 12:49 PM

GregPz

April 19th, 2011, 12:52 PM

GregPz, do you maybe know how exactly do they go about getting these figures, special formula, or just what airlines provide them?
As the above figures for CPT-GRJ, which should be easily calculated as is only served by one airline and pretty much sticks to the same aircraft on the schedules, doesn't seem correct to me.
Simple modest calculation:

Airlink on the route:

13 x weekly flights with 37-seat ERJ135 aircraft = 481seats
6 x weekly flights with 83-seat AvroRJ83 aircraft = 498 seats

= 979 one-way weekly seats

x 52 weeks

= 50 908 seats.

And this is currently the lowest capacity on the route in the last 6 years!

I think the figures are based only on that particular week so may vary depending on flight cancellations or aircraft changes scheduled to occur that week. Not fully accurate but interesting guide nonetheless.

dysan1

April 19th, 2011, 03:44 PM

That's correct, sorry my bad.

The overall figure is at it's highest yes, mainly due to the surge in international figures (driven by Emirates), but also the unscheduled market which was boosted by the World Cup.
Domestic is still lower than 06/07, and Regional ofcourse is totally dead!

Regional is a very weird one in the stats. What is considered regional? Surely the Durban to Maputo flights should be covered under regional, but are clearly being put as international...

grjplanes

April 19th, 2011, 11:33 PM

Regional is considered the SADC countries (Namibia, Botswana, Swaziland and Lesotho). Zimbabwe and Mocambique falls under international. That's why CPT regional is purely Namibian flights, and previously DUR had regional numbers due to Swazi Express having flights to Manzini...which there should be some demand again nowadays.

GetDownAdam

April 20th, 2011, 10:03 PM

Did you mean SACU countries? SADC includes Zim and Moz.

GregPz

April 23rd, 2011, 12:31 PM

A belated posting of the March stats that have already been posted above. In terms of actual passenger numbers JNB recorded by far the highest increase but a large junk of this was "unscheduled" which is probably an adjustment from a previous month.

So in March JNB had 124 316 more pax
DUR 15 436
CPT 10 582
BFN 3 292
GRJ 588
KIM -195
ELS -1 872
PLZ -3 280

http://img576.imageshack.us/img576/6812/acsamonthcopy.jpg (http://img576.imageshack.us/i/acsamonthcopy.jpg/)

http://img594.imageshack.us/img594/6993/acsayearcopy.jpg (http://img594.imageshack.us/i/acsayearcopy.jpg/)

GregPz

April 23rd, 2011, 12:33 PM

Nelspruit meanwhile has started the year with a boom +30.1% in Jan, 22.3% in Feb and 9.1% in March.
In the last 12 months the airport has handled 248 678 pax (+17.5%).

GregPz

May 10th, 2011, 02:42 PM

Busiest Airports in Africa 2010

Unfortunately several of the main airports in Africa still haven't released their 2010 statistics but here's the top 30 based on what's been released so far. The figures in italics are for 2009.

1 Johannesburg 18.38 million passengers 5.4%
2 Cairo 16.15 12.2%
3 Sharm el Sheikh 8.69 17.0%
4 Cape Town 8.11 5.0%
5 Hurghada 8.06 19.8%
6 Casablanca 7.24 13.3%
7 Lagos 5.65
8 Nairobi 5.49 8.0%
9 Durban 4.75 10.4%
10 Algiers 4.55
11 Monastir 4.26
12 Tunis 4.26
13 Addis Ababa 3.78 8.1%
14 Marrakech 3.44 15.0%
15 Abuja 3.20
16 Tripoli 3.07
17 Djerba 2.63
18 Mauritius 2.59 8.7%
19 Luxor 1.97 5.3%
20 St Denis 1.97 12.6%
21 Oran 1.73
22 Dakar 1.70 10.0%
23 Agadir 1.62 11.8%
24 Dar es Salaam 1.42
25 Port Elizabeth 1.41 4.9%
26 Accra 1.41
27 Luanda 1.31
28 Mombasa 1.29
29 Marsa Alam 1.18 25.9%
30 Lanseria (Johannesburg) 1.10

dysan1

May 10th, 2011, 03:18 PM

good to see Greg! How have the rankings changed from 2009? big movers and fallers?

Most noticable is the fall of Cape Town from 3rd to 4th and most likely to 5th shortly.

GregPz

May 10th, 2011, 03:43 PM

Not much change in the rankings although it's difficult to tell properly without the complete updated list. Sharm el Sheikh, Marrakech, St Denis and Marsa Alam (an Egyptian Red Sea resort) all moved up one or two spots. 2011 will obviously see quite a big decline at the Egyptian, Tunisian, Algerian and Libyan airports in the first quarter.

grjplanes

May 10th, 2011, 05:05 PM

Cape Town might be able to regain 3rd spot, as both Hurghada and Sharm el Sheikh would probably decline for 2011 due to earlier unrest and still some uncertainty in Egypt. On the other side CPT should be growing quite good further on in the year, with domestic more flights by both Kulula and Mango to Lanseria as well as the new VelvetSky flights and more to follow. Also increased international flights, already Emirates double daily since end-March, extra Air Namibia Walvis Bay flights...by November the new Air France flights to Paris, Edelweiss to Zurich, Turkish increase to daily, BA seasonal increase from 13 to 14 and upgauging to 747-400 the 2nd daily flight, Zambezi Airlines to Livingstone and Lusaka and KLM using larger 777-300 on some flights.

Same for Lanseria, with Marsa Alam probably to decline, while HLA itself would be growing significantly with more Kulula, plus Mango starting June and the BA regional flights to Gaborone and Maputo to start soon and possibly 1Time later in the year as well.

Would be interesting what happens with Tripoli and Djerba, as Tripoli might probably even fall out of the list. Djerba must have carried thousands more pax during the evacuation period out of Libya.

Mo Rush

May 10th, 2011, 07:06 PM

xAbd0o

May 10th, 2011, 07:18 PM

hehe, don't put your hopes up guys, it's only this year and we're back stronger than before ;)

dysan1

May 11th, 2011, 08:59 AM

Thanks for adding some balanced information.

For a second there I thought CT would drop to 26.

Of course ever the drama queen, but Greg stated previously that Ct had fallen to 5th.

Lets see if all those extra international connections actually do halt the seemingly never ending decline on international. And if they do, that they dont just steal from domestic flights. Monthly figures will tell.

Mo Rush

May 11th, 2011, 01:08 PM

Of course ever the drama queen, but Greg stated previously that Ct had fallen to 5th.

Lets see if all those extra international connections actually do halt the seemingly never ending decline on international. And if they do, that they dont just steal from domestic flights. Monthly figures will tell.

Your comments remain transparent. Hence my response.

GregPz

May 17th, 2011, 10:07 PM

Stats for April. Big increase in international pax at CPT and also DUR and JNB. All had their highest number ever for intl pax for April. However to put it into context, this is only 4.6% and 4.4% higher than 2008 for JNB and CPT respectively.

Overall DUR and CPT had their best April totals ever. What's particularly impressive for DUR is that it's on the back of 12.4% growth in April 2010 (compared to 2.3% at CPT and 0.5% at JNB).

I'll post the 12 month totals on Thursday.

http://i51.tinypic.com/1zdnsi0.jpg

dysan1

May 18th, 2011, 12:14 PM

Your comments remain transparent. Hence my response.

As does all of yours. Mine however is grounded in the numbers not pure fantasy

Mo Rush

May 18th, 2011, 12:18 PM

Ever heard of a balanced view? See grjplanes's post.

You may learn something as a mod.

juzzy

May 18th, 2011, 01:42 PM

so are the days of our lives... once again, one cant say anything about another city without the knives coming out...childish!

Mo Rush

May 18th, 2011, 06:05 PM

One can say exactly what one wishes to say.

This is nice, but....

grjplanes

May 18th, 2011, 08:02 PM

Thanks for the compliment Mo.

And I believe this time around I'm the one that can gloat with best growth airport, after more than 2 years of decline and sluggish growth. You go George (GRJ)!

But ok, I'll be balanced. It was more holidays than usual, where in GRJ's case this usually means more positive, while on other airports it might be positive for the leisure market, but impacts on their larger business travellers. Also vs last year's runway issues which still went into May.

But I believe GRJ is back on track, hopefully more modest than 2004-2007's unsustainable 20-25% growth year-on-year.

The international growth at CPT was mostly based on the extended seasonal flights by international carriers, Virgin Atlantic, Air Berlin and KLM (daily iso 5) which usually ends at end-March and also ofcourse the introduction of Emirates' 2nd daily flight. Thus don't really expect this 20%+ growth for May through to October.

While at DUR it also in a way was affected by the additional holiday periods, obviously Emirates must have carried better loads but nothing was different than last year April...it was infact Air Mauritius which might have had more significant impact on the growth, as they used larger A330 and A340 aircraft on quite a few of their flights during April.

Mo Rush

May 18th, 2011, 11:48 PM

Was sent the last 5 years traffic for CTIA by Greg and it seems that figures support a "real recovery" post 2008 (a rosy year). April 2011 even exceeding 2008 (although slightly) surely is an indication of the room for growth.

We may only fully reach 2008 levels in

Consider that the March to April drop in international arrivals is the least severe in the 2007-2011, which was usually around 1.4:1 as ratio, and for 2011 1.2:1.

Its unlikely June will reach 2010 and 2008 levels, so somewhere close would be a successful month.

Seasonaility really needs to be addressed, even if its a failed attempt.

Ron2K

May 19th, 2011, 06:51 AM

GregPz

May 19th, 2011, 09:01 AM

Here's the stats for the last 12 months.

http://i56.tinypic.com/2hdw4mb.jpg

Mo Rush

May 19th, 2011, 12:29 PM

The thing with seasonality is that Cape Town is predominantly a leisure market, and tourists don't want to visit us in winter because our weather is kak! :lol:

(This is one area where Durban can do a lot of work on.)

indeed. It's called the "Seasonality Smile". Just attended a session about addressing this. Joint marketing agreement between CT, DBN and JHB already helping to promote existing events and boost domestic tourism, CT currently ranked 4th.

Mo Rush

May 19th, 2011, 12:32 PM

The thing with seasonality is that Cape Town is predominantly a leisure market, and tourists don't want to visit us in winter because our weather is kak! :lol:

(This is one area where Durban can do a lot of work on.)

Which is perhaps true in terms of weather, but its more like 4 seasons in a day...with WIND!

World Cup was a good show of how good the weather can be in winter.
Crowds on Fan Walk and sunny days proved this/

dysan1

May 19th, 2011, 12:38 PM

Ever heard of a balanced view? See grjplanes's post.

You may learn something as a mod.

the last bit is laughable given the way you work on this entire forum...mate

But lets move on...

Good to finally see a turnaround on international into CT, bit of a knock on the level of domestic growth but completely expected. What is not expected is the level of strong growth still going through JHB

juzzy

May 19th, 2011, 08:47 PM

not to mention the massive growth going on at DUR. over 60% int'l growth in 1 year is exceptional. where is all this increased domestic traffic at DUR coming from and why???

GregPz

May 24th, 2011, 09:25 AM

Here's a more complete and updated list of the busiest airports in Africa for 2010. The airports in italics haven't released 2010 figures so the most current stats available are used.

http://i52.tinypic.com/2n65do0.jpg

dysan1

May 24th, 2011, 12:59 PM

not to mention the massive growth going on at DUR. over 60% int'l growth in 1 year is exceptional. where is all this increased domestic traffic at DUR coming from and why???

60% is not massive. Its just a few thousand peeps. The domestic is mainly Durban-Jhb traffic

Rosaudio

May 25th, 2011, 01:49 AM

Cant wait to see those Air France flights at FACT :)

GregPz

June 21st, 2011, 11:26 AM

Figures for May show good growth at GRJ & MQP and another good increase in intl pax at DUR. JNB continues with solid growth although domestic is still well behind 2007 figures.

http://i52.tinypic.com/ixehdl.jpg

http://i55.tinypic.com/oi7ho1.jpg

SA BOY

June 21st, 2011, 01:09 PM

juzzy

June 21st, 2011, 01:48 PM

why is durban still getting double digit international growth considering EK has been flying route for over a year? is it their yields and numbers are up? once double daily kicks in it should get even higher

its very encouraging for another EK flight to DUR... i guess the more people are learning of the EK flight out of DUR the more people are making use of it

grjplanes

July 14th, 2011, 11:36 AM

I'm wondering about pax being counted on diverted flights. Thinking about it yesterday after seeing about 7 flights from CPT being diverted to GRJ due to fog around CPT, and considering it has happened a few times the last couple of months...ofcourse also vice versa. All passengers were offloaded and had to wait in the terminal building before flights were cleared to go.

1) Does these pax get counted at all, for scheduled or unscheduled at GRJ, and then again at CPT as scheduled. I can't think that it does because then the same pax on basically the same flight gets counted twice.

2) In rare situations, ie a few weeks ago when a JNB-GRJ flight got diverted to CPT and eventually pax were left on their own and not transported onwards to GRJ by the airline, I believe they get counted in some way at CPT (because it was decided there that their journey is ended), but shouldn't they get counted at GRJ rather where it was their intended destination, and in some cases being dropped their after a bus journey from another airport. (Seen earlier 2010 with the runway issues at GRJ where many pax were bussed after being diverted)

GregPz

July 14th, 2011, 03:30 PM

June stats show some pretty steep declines as result of the increases during the World Cup last year when JNB grew by 15.5%, CPT 10.1%, DUR 8.4% and PLZ 24.6%.

http://i55.tinypic.com/2popoxj.jpg

http://i51.tinypic.com/2prhef5.jpg

GregPz

July 14th, 2011, 03:38 PM

dysan1

July 14th, 2011, 10:26 PM

Interesting to see the big declines, expected I suppose! PE took it hard! Durbs however still managing to motor that domestic over 6%! Impressed

dysan1

July 14th, 2011, 10:32 PM

Also, Durbs looks on track to crack the 5m mark by September

EduardSA

July 15th, 2011, 10:45 AM

I think next year, Johannesburg will break the 20 million line :cheers:

dysan1

July 15th, 2011, 01:07 PM

^^ Possibly, at current 5% growth by this time next year it will still be under the 20m mark. If the growth increases then that could be reached sooner.

However, for every extra international flight that leaves directly from Durban or Cape Town, Joburg is rather strongly affected.

eg: If a passenger goes from Durban to London via Joburg, that one passenger would count as 4 passenger movements for the airport (Arriving domestic, departing int, arriving int, departing domestic). If the passenger can leave directly from Durban, Joburg loses 4 passenger movements. Multiply that 200 people per day by 365 days and just one flight from Durban to London could cut 292,000 off the Joburg passenger tally.

grjplanes

July 15th, 2011, 02:25 PM

However, for every extra international flight that leaves directly from Durban or Cape Town, Joburg is rather strongly affected.

I wouldn't exactly agree with that. JNB still records pretty steady international growth, as well as domestic. Since Emirates came to Durban, they haven't reduced JNB capacity, infact that is increasing this coming October with one flight changing to A380. The fact that pax that doesn't go via JNB from DUR anymore to whatever destination, just leave the room open for more people residing in Gauteng and other originating destinations within SA and neighbouring countries to fill those seats...as the demand still persist.
It's not as if airlines are moving capacity away from JNB to either CPT or DUR, new services to CPT and DUR is supplemental to their JNB ones. Alot of the international growth comes from African destinations, as there is still massive untapped potential!

Same with domestic growth, at JNB that is still continuing, even since Kulula increased more capacity at Lanseria, and now with Mango also serving Lanseria, both these airlines pretty much kept their capacity at JNB steady. Infact looking at the said domestic route, JNB-DUR, since EK came to DUR, capacity on JNB-DUR still increased basically by all airlines, and infact a new airline launched with that route...

If the economy/ies just a pick up a notch, then all our airports would be back onto a steady growth rate, and we should all be happy that all the airports is growing.

dysan1

July 15th, 2011, 10:02 PM

U not getting what I am saying and I don't disagree with your other points. I'm just saying that OR T benefits excessively from connecting passengers which significantly bolster their passenger numbers. Its that 4 for one trip number I am talking about. All I was saying is that when 1 passenger doesn't go via OR T they lose 4 people, so its important that they keep the connections going to keep the numbers up. The more direct flights from durban and ct, the more "4's" they lose which in turn slows their overall growth, for its really the connecting passengers which bolster it to begin with. Durban and CT only get two movements that passenger, while JHB gets 4. If they go direct from those centres they still get 2, but jhb gets 0.

I was not in one bit referring to anything else but that

dysan1

July 15th, 2011, 10:03 PM

GregPz

August 16th, 2011, 10:33 AM

July Airport Statistics

DUR has highest pax figures ever in a single month and breaks the 5 million mark!

JNB records highest international pax ever

GRJ and BFN grow by over 20%

A good month for all airports apart from PLZ. Last year business traffic was down as a result of the World Cup but the growth is still impressive (especially DUR!) considering the 3 main airports did still see increases last year. BFN and GRJ did decrease by around 15% each last year.

http://i56.tinypic.com/24blw76.jpg

http://i54.tinypic.com/34zdn4o.jpg

Mo Rush

August 16th, 2011, 10:54 AM

SA BOY

August 16th, 2011, 11:13 AM

ya so much for Durban airport being a white elephant. what was the states for the last 12 months of Louis Botha?

romanSA

August 16th, 2011, 11:50 AM

Those are impressive figures for all the airports. Thanks for posting, Greg!

dysan1

August 16th, 2011, 12:00 PM

Wow nearly 20% growth in Durbs! Seriously impressive month! One wonders how Nov and Dec will be considering the massive COP event.

PE is puzzling as it is constantly down. What's going on there?

dysan1

August 16th, 2011, 12:11 PM

Based on Gregs numbers, the main airports carried the following extra passengers in July 2011 over July 2010.

JNB: 80134
CPT: 34613
DUR: 72909

I wonder what drove the massive durban increase. Yes we had a few conferences on and the IOC event, but those event numbers were not massive. More local tourists? As I said before, the Nov and Dec numbers will be very good to see!

GregPz

August 16th, 2011, 12:40 PM

Is the CT total % increase correct.

Domestic 6.5%
International 7%, but overall 5.4%? Total includes unscheduled flights?

Are my stats correct. July combined arrivals best ever July for Cape Town...?

July last year had a lot of unscheduled traffic due to the World Cup which is only included in the total hence the lower overall increase.

Yes, this is CPT's best July (by just over 300 pax) but domestic is still down from 2007 and intl still down from 2008.

GregPz

August 16th, 2011, 12:41 PM

ya so much for Durban airport being a white elephant. what was the states for the last 12 months of Louis Botha?

4.4 million

Mo Rush

August 16th, 2011, 01:15 PM

July last year had a lot of unscheduled traffic due to the World Cup which is only included in the total hence the lower overall increase.

Yes, this is CPT's best July (by just over 300 pax) but domestic is still down from 2007 and intl still down from 2008.

Thank You.

I'm still perplexed as to how the only airport in major RSA city, can be considered a white elephant if there is no alternative.

What exactly does "KSIA is a white elephant" mean...?

SA BOY

August 16th, 2011, 06:26 PM

means okes like gideon said LESS people will fly because airport s too far. White elephant as in under used and a waste of money, sort of like MM and CT stadiums

GregPz

August 31st, 2011, 12:55 PM

CITY AIRPORT SHOWS LARGEST PERCENTAGE GROWTH IN SA

The Pietermaritzburg Airport outstripped other airports in the country by the proverbial mile in percentage growth over the past six years. The city’s airport posted an impressive 15.37% averaged growth over the past six years, well ahead of the national figure of 2.36% based on the total number of passengers passing through 11 of the country’s busiest airports.

With Lanseria a notable omission, the statistics were compiled at the airports of Bloemfontein, East London, Port Elizabeth, George, Cape Town, Kimberley, Upington, Johannesburg, Durban, Pietermaritzburg and Richard’s Bay.

Pietermaritzburg Airport leads the pack, courtesy of an astonishing 55.04% increase in passenger traffic this year to date, and at an average of 15.37%, is well ahead of Bloemfontein (9.15%) and Upington (8.9%). Of the country’s three largest airports, the King Shaka International/Durban International airports recorded by far the largest growth – 5.06% against the 2.25% of Oliver Tambo International and Cape Town International’s surprisingly modest 1,42%. The figures show a marked correlation between passenger traffic and the impact of the recession – while the national growth average was 7.79% and 13.75% in 2006 and 2007, the figure shrank to -4.20 and -5.26 in 2008 and 2009. Pietermaritzburg Airport suffered the single biggest annual reverse during the six years under review when traffic retreated by -19.81% in 2009. However, a series of investments in new landing lights, communication equipment and a runway upgrade saw the airport posting by far the biggest percentage increase less than two years later, and that with only half the year gone.

http://www.ebizblitz.co.za/jit_news/2011/08/23/jit_default_169.E-Biz_Blitz-23_August_2011.html

GregPz

August 31st, 2011, 01:06 PM

PIETERMARITZBURG AIRPORT SOARS TO NEW HEIGHTS

Passenger movement statistics paint a rosy picture of the Pietermaritzburg Airport’s performance over the past few months, according to research by KZN Treasury economist Clive Coetzee. A new record was established in June 2011 when 10 136 passengers passed through the Airport to continue an upward trend measured in April (7 388) and May (9 543).

Total arrivals and departures from the city’s airport from May 2010 to June 2011 amount to 133 205 passengers that compares favourably with the Kimberley Airport that processed 125 034 passengers during the same period. The reasons for the city airport’s performance are attributed to the extra flights by the jet aircraft and the multi-million upgrade of facilities, including the runway.

http://www.bizblitz.co.za/jit_news/2011/08/17/jit_default_165.E-Biz_Blitz-17_August_2011.html

SA BOY

August 31st, 2011, 02:09 PM

go maritzbara

so where do you fly to from maritzburg cos you cant come to cape town? Durban and joburg I imagine

GregPz

August 31st, 2011, 02:14 PM

Currently just Jo'burg. There used to be flights to Ulundi and Durban (12 min flight) and for a short while ELS/PLZ and Bloem. I think the airport will need to be expanded before it can handle more destinations.

dysan1

August 31st, 2011, 02:48 PM

Great to see for PMB! I really think a CPT route could be squeezed in here and BA should look at using their new smaller planes to fly to JHB or Lanseria.

The current growth wont be sustainable without new infrastructure, but also without competition.

Interesting to see Durban so far ahead of the other main cities. Doesnt make sense with durban traffic generally going thru jhb

dysan1

September 1st, 2011, 10:27 AM

another article on pmb's success.

Airport boasts rise in passengersAugust 31 2011 at 05:16pm
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
INLSA

Leanne Jansen

Investments in infrastructure, location and Pietermaritzburg’s status as KwaZulu-Natal’s provincial capital have all contributed to the city’s airport recording the largest increase in passenger traffic among 11 counterparts around the countr. This is according to the Msunduzi Tourism Association and the Pietermaritzburg Chamber of Business, commenting on passenger movement data recently released by local economist Clive Coetzee.

According to the research, Pietermaritzburg Airport boasts a 55.04 percent increase in total passenger traffic for 2011 to date, and an average growth of 15.37 percent over the past six years.

Chamber chief executive officer Melanie Veness said while she had not had the opportunity to scrutinise the data, she imagined that the increase was largely because of improved facilities, the availability and reliability of jet flights and the fact that the flights had been more reasonably priced.

“Since King Shaka is further away than Durban International was, travelling to the main airport has become more difficult for people from this area, and this has made the Pietermaritzburg Airport a very attractive option for travel to Johannesburg. This is true for people from Kloof, Pinetown and even the South Coast,” she said.

Msunduzi Tourism Association president Dumisani Mhlongo believed the economic growth which accompanied the city’s capital status, and sporting events in the region – still basking in the afterglow of the Fifa World Cup – were part and parcel of the achievement.

In March, Airlink doubled its flights and introduced competitive fares between Johannesburg and Pietermaritzburg.

Coetzee had previously said these were the two biggest impediments for the airport, which had resulted in travellers opting to fly from King Shaka International Airport.

The airport itself did not fare badly according to the research. Fine marketing, the hosting of high-profile events and the buy-in of Emirates Airlines, are what tourism authorities believe have seen the airport pip its Joburg and Cape Town counterparts to the post as the airport to have shown the biggest spike in passenger traffic over the past five years.

From 2006 to 2011, King Shaka recorded an average 5.06 percent growth in passenger traffic.

Roshene Singh, the chief marketing officer at South African Tourism, commended Durban and KwaZulu-Natal on the “fantastic job of promoting the province as a lifestyle, business and events destination for both local and international guests”.

“The city hosts the annual Tourism Indaba, has this year hosted the International Olympic Committee’s 123rd Session, and of course will soon be hosting the United Nations Climate Change Conference, which will bring thousands more high-profile international guests to Durban.

“The addition of international flights from Emirates Airlines through King Shaka would also have had an impact on passenger traffic. We want to commend the city and province on their efforts and will work even harder with them to continue to bring good tourism numbers into Durban,” Singh said.

Veness agreed that the international flights had had a “very positive impact on arrival figures”, adding that “ease of access to an area is key in stimulating economic growth”.

Lihle Dlamini, spokeswoman for Tourism KZN, believed King Shaka would attract even greater numbers, because it was expected that by October Emirates Airlines would have increased flights to Durban. However, she also said domestic tourism was what drove Durban’s figures up.

http://www.iol.co.za/mercury/airport-boasts-rise-in-passengers-1.1128876

dysan1

September 16th, 2011, 02:15 PM

heya Greg what time of the month do the new stats come out? does it vary?

GregPz

September 16th, 2011, 03:31 PM

Normally the 16th (today). Not much growth for Aug unfortunately.

dysan1

September 16th, 2011, 03:34 PM

^^ not surprised to hear that

GregPz

September 16th, 2011, 04:35 PM

August 2011

JNB +0.5% (Dom +0.2% Intl +0.8%)

CPT +2.3% (Dom +1.5% Intl +7.2%)

DUR +2.3% (Dom +1.8% Intl +15.0%)

dysan1

September 19th, 2011, 01:40 PM

shoo that is a big turnaround from last month.

GregPz

September 20th, 2011, 12:55 PM

As mentioned Aug was a rather flat month for our airports. I included Nelspruit as it at least had a big increase. It's looking likely that this month we'll be in negative territory. It's worth noting thought that this was still the best Aug ever for DUR, BFN and MQP and these 3 have their highest ever 12 month totals.

http://i56.tinypic.com/2w2j4ll.jpg

http://i55.tinypic.com/214p3cl.jpg

annman

September 21st, 2011, 10:15 AM

^^ Yikes, PE still in decline. :ohno:

dysan1

September 21st, 2011, 11:44 AM

yeah PE has been in a bad state for over a year now.

GregPz

September 21st, 2011, 03:12 PM

PE isn't actually doing as bad as most of the other smaller airports though. Here's the change in pax numbers since 2007 (when numbers peaked):

JNB -2.5% (Dom -10.4, Int +7.3)
CPT -0.3% (Dom -0.2, Int -0.8)
DUR +4.4% (Dom +1.2, Int +392.9)
PLZ -7.3%
ELS -8.5%
GRJ -14.8%
BFN +1.2%
KIM -10.2%

romanSA

September 21st, 2011, 04:01 PM

Air Mauritius has announced extra flights into Durban over Dec 2011-Jan 2012 due to demand, so we could be seeing a small increase in Durban's international figures over that period.

romanSA

September 21st, 2011, 04:02 PM

GregPz

October 18th, 2011, 11:46 AM

Very little growth for September but apart from PE no big declines. The smaller airports BFN, KIM and MQP had good growth.

http://i54.tinypic.com/2yphv94.jpg

http://i56.tinypic.com/mljvaq.jpg

Source: ACSA and kmiairport.co.za

annman

October 18th, 2011, 12:00 PM

^^ Good to see all is on the up, although increases are mostly modest for our larger airports, in the current economic climate, good to see some marginal growth. Looks like George is going to turn the corner; they were in decline, but seems it's bottomed out now and may begin its recovery soon. Good on the smallest airports, thanks to LCC's and SA Express increasing capacity to these airports. :)

PE is a huge worry... this must be very alarming, as these declines are indicative of less tourism and less business travel. Something must be done in that area... PE is literally hemorrhaging PAX numbers. :ohno:

Lydon

October 18th, 2011, 12:11 PM

Damn this tinypic being blocked at work nonsense!

grjplanes

October 18th, 2011, 04:51 PM

Looks like George is going to turn the corner; they were in decline, but seems it's bottomed out now and may begin its recovery soon. Good on the smallest airports, thanks to LCC's and SA Express increasing capacity to these airports.

George actually had better growth over the last couple of months (at least April to August) than September, which was just up by a few numbers. September growth I guess was a bit dampened due to the school holiday being so late (usually starts within the last week of Sept, this year was on the last day) as well as the 24th Sept falling on a Saturday, thus resulting in no long-weekend. Growth for GRJ seems to be picking up yes, and from this month, October, 1Time is back on it's full schedule of 9 weekly flights as well as SA Express that have added 3 additional weekly flights.

The growth at the other 3 smaller airports that was doing so good isn't much to do with LCC, but more with SA Express (BFN and KIM) and BA/Comair (MQP). Infact only BFN is served by an LCC (Mango) which has actually reduced flights again on JNB-BFN down to only 3 weekly flights (although I don't think this route operated last year Sept yet then). SA Express is replacing their smaller 50-seat DH3 aircraft with 74-seater DH4 aircraft on both BFN and KIM routes from JNB...while just this week SAX also launched a CPT-KIM route, after Airlink lately replaces their ERJ flight now and then with AR8 aircaft as well. MQP had the BA flights doubled (albeit with smaller aircraft, but still capacity increase) and I think just generally doing good on all it's routes by Airlink to JNB,CPT,DUR and LVI...infact SA Express has dropped it's weekend flights from JNB though.
Would be interesting to see the MQP international flights also being seperated, although it might be very small with just the Livingstone and Vilanculous flights.
CPT's international growth is quite impressive and looking forward to even better growth from now on with still Edelweiss and Air France to introduce flights as well as increased capacity/frequency by BA, Virgin, Lufthansa, Singapore and Air Namibia, while the 2nd additional Emirates flight and Zambezi flights still has to complete a year also.

Switch

October 18th, 2011, 05:57 PM

pdutoit

October 19th, 2011, 09:06 AM

Is KSIA suppose to be able to handle 7 million pax per annum?

If so then by my calculation it would need to open an upgrade in about 4-5 years.
5,000,000 in the last twelve months
at 8% increase equals 400,000.

I am sure the current terminal could handle 7 million easily but the question is for how long can it maitain?

But then again there was a decrease in international pax in the last month. Will be interesting to see how the next few months!

I think that one of the factors that needs to be taken into account is the fact that DIA functioned at maximum capacity. The rapid growth of KSIA is to al large extent due to an over demand and under supply of DIA that needed release. I'm not sure if 8% growth can be maintained in view of the current economic slump.

GregPz

November 16th, 2011, 11:47 AM

October was better than I'd expected for our airports.
*JNB handled the highest number of international pax ever in a single month!
*CPT had the 2nd highest number of domestic pax ever.
*DUR and MQP had their 3rd highest total pax.
*CPT, DUR and MQP were the only airports to record their best ever October for total pax. CPT and DUR were both about 34 000 pax better than their previous records.

Intl traffic performed well for CPT but is still down by over 10% on 2008 levels. Traffic was pretty flat at DUR but in 2010 it recorded growth significantly higher than any other airports.

http://i40.tinypic.com/35a8wn8.jpg

So for the last 12 months CPT, DUR and MQP are all on record levels. All the other airports (apart from BFN) are still well below 2007 levels and are very unlikely to get there before the end of the year. Hopefully we'll see JNB get back above the 10m mark for domestic pax though.

http://i41.tinypic.com/2vaz3p0.jpg

Source ACSA and KMIA

dysan1

November 16th, 2011, 02:17 PM

Sadly PE continues to lose passengers! Were the number of seats on the route cut? Lets see how the start of Velvet Sky in November will affect things.

Any news on PMB?

Great to see Durban, CT and MQP at record levels.

Here is hoping that the coming November and December are good months, especially with the many additional flights that have been put on by Velvet Sky and some of the other operators. Plus the international capacity upgrades for the summer. Here's to it being better than last.

Mo Rush

November 16th, 2011, 03:11 PM

When we say "record levels? Does this mean for the previous 12 months, the total arrivals is the highest ever?

GregPz

November 16th, 2011, 03:33 PM

When we say "record levels? Does this mean for the previous 12 months, the total arrivals is the highest ever?

Yup!

Lydon

November 17th, 2011, 11:11 AM

Excellent growth for Cape Town :cheers: It's about time.

Mo Rush

December 16th, 2011, 02:06 AM

Please confirm.

CTIA November Arrivals
International +14% on Nov 2010
Domestic + 4% on Nov 2010

GregPz

December 21st, 2011, 01:04 PM

Modest growth for SA airports in Nov. DUR was the only major airport to have its best Nov ever, as did KIM, BFN and MQP. Otherwise a month of the usual with PE dropping for the 6th consecutive month.

http://i43.tinypic.com/2mcbktu.jpg

http://i41.tinypic.com/raz12t.jpg

Mo Rush

December 21st, 2011, 03:06 PM

annman

December 21st, 2011, 09:52 PM

^^ I've been worried for months now, but PE still in decline!??? Holy crap!!! :doh: Well done, glad to see CTIA above pre-recessionary levels. :)

grjplanes

December 22nd, 2011, 07:48 AM

^^ And that while Velvet Sky introduced flights to PE and SAX increased capacity on both CPT and DUR routes as well as the re-introduction of BFN flights.
I'm wondering what effect the change from Kulula to BA is having after the flights to CPT and DUR were changed, are those flights more expensive now?

Btw, I just checked the figures on ACSA's site and Bloemfontein's scheduled traffic is actually just lower (basically even), it was the unscheduled traffic that had a boom due to troops being flown in for training on chartered flights (somebody mentioned an A330 or 767 doing a few visits to BFN)

Great to see GRJ up that well again though, can't wait for Dec figures as I expect it to be best ever (see George Airport thread).

GregPz

December 22nd, 2011, 08:23 AM

GRJ would need growth of over 16% to have it's best Dec so that would be really impressive. It should end the year as having the biggest increase after MQP and BFN. I don't think there'll be much of an increase for DUR as its averaged 11.4% for the last 2 Decembers (compared with the next highest, JNB at 4.9%).

annman

December 22nd, 2011, 08:59 AM

^^ That's why I'm so concerned. Airports are a good gauge of a healthy economy balancing business activity with tourism arrivals. Clearly something terrible is afoot. Something has to be done to kick-start the Eastern Cape economy, nevermind stagnation, seems it's actually contracting! The Western Cape government already recognises the EC at a threat to provincial stability. When a neighbouring province becomes a "threat" like an unstable neighbouring country, something MUST be done.

GregPz

December 30th, 2011, 08:43 AM

Here's the top 60 airports in Africa from the ACI monthly reports. Figures are for the 12 months up to Sep 2011. In a few cases the most up to date figures are 12 months to July 2011.
* indicates year end to Dec 2010.
Some of the SA figures to vary slightly from ACSA stats for some reason.

1 Johannesburg, S.Africa 19.03 million 4.2%
2 Cairo, Egypt 13.22 -14.7%
3 Cape Town, S.Africa 8.30 3.3%
4 Casablanca, Morocco 7.35 3.4%
5 Hurghada, Egypt 6.38 -17.4%
6 Lagos, Nigeria* 6.22 8.6%
7 Sharm el Sheikh, Egypt 6.18 -26.6%
8 Nairobi, Kenya* 5.49 8.0%
9 Durban, South Africa 5.00 8.1%
10 Algiers, Algeria 4.56 3.1%
11 Abuja, Nigeria 4.15 17.6%
12 Tunis, Tunisia 4.02 -10.5%
13 Addis Ababa, Ethiopia* 3.78 6.4%
14 Marrakech, Morocco 3.50 6.2%
15 Mauritius 2.65 4.9%
16 Luanda, Angola* 2.43 9.4%
17 Khartoum, Sudan* 2.18 -8.0%
18 St Denis, Reunion 2.12 11.1%
19 Djerba, Tunisia 1.93 -21.2%
20 Accra, Ghana 1.82 19.0%
21 Dakar, Senegal 1.82 14.4%
22 Dar es Salaam, Tanzania 1.77 16.7%
23 Oran, Algeria* 1.73 na
24 Agadir, Morocco 1.56 -0.6%
25 Monastir, Tunisia 1.45 na
26 Port Elizabeth, S.Africa 1.37 -1.6%
27 Mombasa, Kenya* 1.26 14.2%
28 Luxor, Egypt 1.23 -34.7%
29 Port Harcourt, Nigeria* 1.22 16.6%
30 Marsa Alam, Egypt* 1.18 25.9%
31 Entebbe, Uganda 1.15 8.6%
32 Lanseria, South Africa* 1.10 na
33 Enfidha, Tunisia 1.10 na
34 Borg Al-Arab, Egypt 0.92 29.9%
35 Tangier, Morocco 0.84 13.9%
36 Fez, Morocco 0.83 22.7%
37 Antanarivo, Madagascar 0.79 8.5%
38 Lusaka, Zambia 0.78 12.1%
39 Maputo, Mozambique 0.78 9.7%
40 Libreville, Gabon 0.76 2.4%
41 Harare, Zimbabwe* 0.75 22.0%
42 Alexandria, Egypt 0.73 -22.1%
43 Brazzaville, Congo* 0.73 na
44 Windhoek, Namibia 0.71 3.6%
45 East London, S.Africa 0.68 2.7%
46 Douala, Cameroon* 0.67 -4.2%
47 Kinshasa, DRC* 0.67 na
48 Ilha do Sal, Cape Verde 0.65 9.8%
49 Bamako, Mali* 0.63 na
50 Abidjan, Ivory Coast 0.63 -35.5%
51 Zanzibar, Tanzania* 0.62 6.3%
52 Kilamanjaro, Tanzania 0.60 32.1%
53 Nador, Morocco 0.56 40.5%
54 George, S.Africa 0.56 6.3%
55 Aswan, Egypt 0.54 -41.2%
56 Lome, Togo 0.54 72.2%
57 Praia, Cape Verde 0.53 9.5%
58 Oujda, Morocco 0.52 16.3%
59 Abu Simbel, Egypt* 0.49 9.1%
60 Bloemfontein, S.Africa 0.43 8.6%

Rosaudio

January 2nd, 2012, 11:09 PM

Flew CPT-FRA-CPT over the holiday period and both flights were completely packed. Actually both were overbooked leaving a few unhappy people. Couldn't even get my desired window seat :(

Just need an aircraft upgrade.. those 747s are shocking. (A380 anyone? :D)

Ron2K

January 3rd, 2012, 06:16 AM

^^ CPT isn't A380 compatible. Just JNB (and DUR as the diversion airport).

Rosaudio

January 3rd, 2012, 03:14 PM

^^ CPT isn't A380 compatible. Just JNB (and DUR as the diversion airport).

Yeah I know. :(

Hopefully they'll upgrade it sometime in the future.

Ron2K

January 3rd, 2012, 03:17 PM

Yeah, will probably happen whenever the runway realignment project happens (speaking of which, haven't heard anything else on that in a while...).

Mo Rush

January 12th, 2012, 02:53 PM

When we say over 8 million passengers for e.g. CTIA? Do we mean arrivals?

GregPz

January 12th, 2012, 03:20 PM

Arrivals and departures

annman

January 16th, 2012, 02:17 PM

^^ Alan Winde announced that CTIA has had its highest PAX figures to date. Is this information accurate?

GregPz

January 20th, 2012, 11:31 AM

December turned out to be a good month for our airports.

* Highest ever monthly international pax for JNB and CPT
* Best monthly total pax ever for DUR and CPT
* Highest ever domestic pax for DUR
* GRJ had excellent growth but overall still only its 4th best Dec figures

http://i44.tinypic.com/ddj1pf.jpg

So for 2011 CPT, DUR, BFN and MQP ended the year with their highest ever total figures. This was also the highest international pax total for JNB.

http://i43.tinypic.com/qoerdl.jpg

GregPz

January 20th, 2012, 11:39 AM

The actual number of pax that each airport gained or lost in 2011 compared to 2010 is:

JNB 542 361 (Dom 406 509 Intl 199 031)
CPT 328 865 (Dom 269 164 Intl 83 362)
DUR 283 271 (Dom 281 415 Intl 12 005)
PLZ -40 040
ELS 9 846
GRJ 38 468
BFN 34 230
KIM 3 183
MQP 23 930

annman

January 20th, 2012, 12:15 PM

^^ When is the hemorrhaging at PE going to stop? :ohno: At least good to see the December figures are flat and there has not been a further decline in the Eastern Cape.

grjplanes

January 20th, 2012, 02:57 PM

GregPz, will you please paste this year totals also in the World Airport rankings thread in the general airports section. You must sommer put the whole lot, because I see most other people from other countries post up to most of their smaller airports as well. And I think we can be proud on these figures.

It's a shame about PLZ still stagnated, considering VelvetSky flights in December and 1Time having several extra flights. Same with ELS though, 1Time also had several extra flights there over Dec.

Ofcourse I'm proud of GRJ, my estimate was 33 960 arriving scheduled pax, which in the end was 34 917 (14,9% growth over last Dec), so I was a modest 1000 under. This arriving pax number is infact the 2nd highest ever. On the other hand though with the inland school holidays starting so much later, this resulted in the departing pax for Dec not growing as much, bringing the overall total growth down. BUT this would then mean January should be having a much higher growth in departing pax, but also arriving shouldn't be too bad with more people opting to also go on holiday later after New Years...and ofcourse this weekend's Volvo Golf Championship should give a boost as well (as these last 2 weeks in January is usually the most quietest time of domestic travel anywhere).

GregPz

February 17th, 2012, 02:26 PM

Quite a mixed month but good growth from CPT, GRJ and BFN. CPT set a new record for international pax in a single month. Disappointing to see a drop at DUR but must be seen in the context of 17% growth last January.

http://i40.tinypic.com/2r4q150.jpg

http://i40.tinypic.com/2ql8zug.jpg

dysan1

February 17th, 2012, 08:27 PM

sad to see the drop in durban...

the funny thing is the relatively high domestic growth in CT? please explain how that is possible with jhb barely growing and durban in negative as those are by far the vast majority of source markets for CT

Dale1

February 18th, 2012, 09:42 AM

Disappointing Domestic figures for Durbs but good International figures. Wonder why domestic wasnt that great?!

Lydon

February 18th, 2012, 09:51 AM

Wow...amazing growth for CPT :cheers:

juzzy

February 18th, 2012, 10:22 AM

Disappointing Domestic figures for Durbs but good International figures. Wonder why domestic wasnt that great?!

maybe more people making use of EK instead of JNB transit hence increase in int'l and decrease in domestic...just a thought

GregPz

February 18th, 2012, 11:33 AM

annman

February 18th, 2012, 02:03 PM

Jeez, the Western Cape is "flying high" - excuse the pun. Cape Town and George's growth is phenomenal. But yes, I do think Lanseria is a huge factor, as many Capetonians love flying there rather than OR Tambo. I wouldn't get too worried about Durbs, summer is it's "sticky season," winter is when Durban shines, plus, most Gauteng tourists to Durbs drive there.

PE is a huge worry. Really, it looks like the Eastern Cape has basically closed for business. It's like the place is hemorrhaging money and commerce out of every orifice. A long-term decline in air passenger numbers (a trend that is accelerating, not leveling off) like it's experiencing is a horrible and ominous sign of a slow destruction of the economic system and lagging tourism sector. And with the huge plans the PGWC has for Saldanha and massive upgrades coming to Port Natal; this may be the final death-knell for Coega.

It shows you what happens to a place through prolonged poor governance. Other than Baywest and the Boardwalk Conv. Centre, the province is in utter decline. It's SO sad! Such a beautiful place with so much lost potential. I hope something changes soon.

dysan1

February 18th, 2012, 03:35 PM

Maybe thanks to Mango's CPT-Lanseria flights

ah good point.

dysan1

February 18th, 2012, 03:38 PM

annman

February 18th, 2012, 03:50 PM

^^ I really think the endemic poor-governance, chaotic economic vision and rampant corruption are rotting away at the province like a cancer. Corruption in isolated incidents doesn't seem like the end of the world, but this is what happens when it becomes entrenched; it can paralyze a region and destroy growth. Even in the Provincial Govt. of the Western Cape, the secret is out: the Eastern Cape is considered a massive threat! The PAX figures being in negative territory, not for months, but years now, are symptomatic of an economy in decline... it's absolutely scary and the W.Cape is becoming very jittery about our neighbour.

Rosaudio

February 19th, 2012, 02:41 PM

Well the massive CT growth is to be expected over the holiday period seeing that Cape Town is an iconic holiday destination, plus it has recieved a lot of international recognition in 2011 bringing in more tourists. (TripAdvisor comes to mind)

Durbans growth in Int and decline in domestic must be due to Emirates as somebody already said. Less people flying to JNB and more going straight to Dubai and onwards.

waltjie

February 27th, 2012, 08:38 PM

More Travellers Coming To SA

The number of foreign arrivals in SA increased by 7.6 percent year on year (y/y) to 1 080 029 in November 2011, Statistics SA said on Monday, with the number of overseas visitors rising by 8.7 percent y/y to 215 235.

In November 2011, the distribution of overseas tourists were as follows; Europe, 137 584 (63.9 percent); followed by Asia, 29 722 (13.8 percent); North America, 26 563 (12.3percent); Australasia, 10 267 (4.8 percent); Central and South America, 7900 (3,7 percent) and the Middle East, 3199 (1,5 percent).

Virtually all tourists from Africa came from the Southern African Development Community (SADC) countries with 468 758 (96.3 percent).

The distribution of the remaining tourists from Africa is as follows: West Africa, 9738 (2.0 percent); East and Central Africa, 6866 (1.4 percent) and North Africa 1,291 (0.3 percent).

The UK was the leading source of overseas visitors at 38 286 (17.8 percent), followed by Germany, 29 849 (13.9 percent); the US 21 371 (9.9 percent); The Netherlands, 12 987 (6.0 percent); France, 11 231 (5.2 percent); China, 10 935 (5.1 percent); Australia 8481 (3.9 percent) and India, 7470 (3.5 percent).

Tourists from these eight countries constituted 65.3 percent of all tourists from overseas countries.

A comparison between movements in November 2010 and November 2011 shows that the number of tourists increased in five of these countries (China, Germany, The Netherlands, USA and India) while the number of tourists declined in the other three countries (France, UK and Australia).

China had the highest increase of 45.3 percent y/y, while France had the greatest decline of 4.9 percent y/y.

The eight leading countries in the number of tourists visiting South Africa in November 2011 from the SADC countries were Lesotho, 121 049 (25.8 percent); Zimbabwe, 121 021 (25.8 percent); Mozambique 83 893 (17.9 percent); Swaziland, 54 746 (11.7 percent); Botswana, 36 774 (7.8 percent); Namibia, 14 575 (3.1 percent); Zambia, 13 445 (2.9 percent) and Malawi, 12 896 (2.8 percent).

A comparison between movements in November 2010 and November 2011 shows that the number of tourists increased in five countries (Swaziland, Zambia, Namibia, Lesotho and Malawi) and declined in the remaining three (Botswana, Zimbabwe and Mozambique).

Swaziland had the highest increase of 16.9 percent y/y, while Botswana had the
greatest decline of 11.0 percent y/y.

The eight leading countries in the number of tourists visiting South Africa in November 2011 from 'other' African countries, were Nigeria, 6226 (34.8 percent); Kenya, 2937 (16.4 percent); Ghana, 1830 (10.2 percent); Uganda, 1354 (7.6 percent); Ethiopia, 742 (4.1 percent); Egypt, 636 (3.6 percent); Cameroon, 499 (2.8 percent) and Gabon, 471 (2.6 percent).

iafrica.com

Caisson Boy

February 28th, 2012, 09:16 AM

Hahaha, but how many of those Nigerians actually leave again? ;-)

grjplanes

March 20th, 2012, 09:18 AM

Any stats for Feb then...presume all should have increased due to extra day...

GregPz

March 20th, 2012, 10:27 AM

Yip small increases mainly due to the extra day. But good growth at CPT and GRJ and big increase in intl traffic for DUR.

http://i39.tinypic.com/1fw8pw.jpg

http://i44.tinypic.com/24zazb9.jpg

GregPz

March 20th, 2012, 10:29 AM

Despite the increases all round for ACSA airports BFN is the only one to have exceeded Feb 2008 levels for domestic pax. CPT and DUR are slightly above 2008 when it comes to total pax.

annman

March 20th, 2012, 03:02 PM

^^ George is REALLY on the up-and-up; shocks me, but with those growth rates, George could well become SA's 5th busiest airport in 3 years if East London continues to stagnate; Quite a feat for a small provincial city of just 200,000 so people. Well done to CTIA and KSIA for breaching the key 8.5million and 5.0million PAX numbers for the 1st time! Even seems poor ol' PE might just be bottoming out of their decline; good to see the numbers finally climbing again in Feb... may this be just the beginning.

GregPz

March 20th, 2012, 03:29 PM

George did surpass EL form one year in 2005 when it had an annual growth of 35% (although EL also didn't do too badly with 32% back then).

dysan1

March 20th, 2012, 04:10 PM

honestly cannot see that growth in George continuing. There were alot of extra flights put on for a season.

What happened for the increase in int in Durbs? Was flying to Dubai and Singapore this week, but the past two weeks all Emirates flights have been fully booked out of Durban. So canned Dubai and just doing Singapore through SQ. That new plane to Durbs cant come quick enough

grjplanes

March 20th, 2012, 04:28 PM

honestly cannot see that growth in George continuing. There were alot of extra flights put on for a season

No, Feb is way after the real holiday season. No additional flights were put in during February, infact 1Time actually operated less flights (7 weekly instead of 9 weekly) all throughout Feb and Airlink had a 2 or 3 flights cancelled to DUR. I believe growth of 5-10% is sustainable for the future if the economy doesn't take a sudden turn for the worse soon, the 25%+ growth that GRJ had during 2004-2007 is not sustainable and actually GRJ is still below those levels, so just growing back to those levels at a more modest pace.
For Feb specific, George hosts 2 of it's biggest events, the George Old Car Show which is now the largest old car show in the country and also the Outeniqua WheelChair Marathon, which this year surpassed the 1000 mark for participants. Also I guess people that are not school holiday bound realises more and more that February is actually the best month for Garden Route beaches!

annman

March 20th, 2012, 04:37 PM

^^ Also, the Western Cape is really gearing up the pace of investment and commitment to the George and Garden Route region, so i do think 7% is very sustainable.

dysan1

March 20th, 2012, 05:34 PM

will all depend on what those areas do economically. they still really are leisure not investment destinations and for that to change there composition will need to change. but wld be good to take up the masses of empty homes down that way

Dale1

March 20th, 2012, 06:12 PM

Durban's international numbers did flippin well in Feb compared to last year. It looks like we could break the 200000 int. pax for a calender year next month. That will be a good milestone. True about Emirates, they cant send the B777 soon enough.

GregPz

April 18th, 2012, 03:35 PM

Not very impressive figures for March but no doubt the demise of Velvet Sky had an effect. However CPT did post it's best month ever for domestic pax and had good growth in intl pax (although not up to 2008 figure). JNB managed to inch pas the 19m point again and DUR had good intl growth pushing it above 200k for the year.

http://i42.tinypic.com/21kf6ns.jpg

http://i41.tinypic.com/29pd7y1.jpg

dysan1

April 18th, 2012, 04:08 PM

yeah not surprising but good to see the intl growth in CT holding strong and durban definately pushing its limits and needng the extra emirates capacity.

PE seems to be getting worse though!!!

Dale1

April 18th, 2012, 06:49 PM

Im really chuft that Durbs hit 200 000 international pax for 2011/2012. Despite Air Mauritius leaving in October, Durbs should still have a better year this next year as Emirates is putting a bigger plane on the route and SA Express are supposed to start flying into Africa. And then Kenya Airways plans on flying to Durbs in the 2013/2014 year,according to their big expansion plans, and you never know maybe a London flight happens in the next year or so. I honestly cant see Durban not having a London flight in 2 years time. Durbs is definitely on the up with international passengers.

dysan1

April 18th, 2012, 07:56 PM

^^ on that note i did hear rumblings from a mate that works with Qatar that they are looking to take up their Durban and Cape Town options no later than Q1 2013

annman

April 18th, 2012, 09:48 PM

PE seems to be getting worse though!!!
Guess I spoke to soon last month, saying PE had bottomed out. Now they're dropping again... Tsk tsk tsk!!! :no:

Well done Cape Town and Durban. Seems George is still climbing nicely too. Would love to see the effect SAX will have on int'l pax at KSIA

dysan1

April 18th, 2012, 10:12 PM

^^ dont think the effect will be tooo massive esp if the planes are mainly 50-80 seaters...

so if it is 6 routes with on average say 4 return flights a week? on a 50 seater... thats 124,800 possible seats in a 52 week cycle. if the capacity is greater/frequency more than it could hit over 150,000. Ok so bigger than i was thinking when i wrote my first comment, but not as big an impact as an extra daily Emirates flight will have.

grjplanes

April 18th, 2012, 11:15 PM

I doubt that VelvetSky's demise could have had a big impact, as they only started operating in the last week of March last year with a handfull of flights between JNB,CPT and DUR.
I think 1Time's shift to Lanseria with some flights, and eventual reduction from JNB had an impact on JNB. Also the restructuring by SA Express on basically all their routes could have had some small impact, as many routes have reduced capacity now.
International at JNB seems to handle recent cancelled and lost airlines quite well, although I believe these figures include Regional as well which did pretty well. With JNB having lost Malaysian, Zambezi, Air Zimbabwe, Hewa Bora, TAP Air Portugal and also now Iberia at the end of this month, things could have looked much worse if it wasn't for SAA's uptake of several new African routes, Beijing and increase in frequency and capacity on many of their African routes. Also some small things ahead that keeps it positive, like Eritrean (suppose to have started today, but didn't), Korongo Airlines starting tomorrow, Air Nigeria said to start in May, Airlink to start flights to Maun, Air Mauritius to increase flights later in the year and also 1Time increasing Zanzibar to 3 weekly and the introduction of Mombasa. BA's extra 3 weekly flights and the use of A380 by Emirates is also a bonus.
CPT's international increases would probably slow down during the winter season (April-September) as many of the extra and new flights launched last October is only seasonal till end-March. Although CPT keeps increased frequency by Turkish and Singapore (both via JNB) and Air Namibia, it has lost Etihad (via JNB), Malaysian, reduced SA Express flights to Windhoek, Walvis Bay and Maputo.
Anything can happen in DUR over the next few months, with so many rumours and hopes, but with EK increasing to the 777-300ER, even that alone can almost make up for the loss of Air Mauritius in capacity. If SAX starts soon, then that could be a catalyst for more.
There is also the rumoured MGC airline from Lesotho that bought 2x 50-seat CRJ-200 aircraft from SAX and set to start flights to all 3 (JNB,CPT and DUR).

Ofcourse proud of GRJ again, now technically speaking fastest growing again, although the March growth is lower than previous few months. Easter and next weekend's long-weekend could have a reasonable impact this year. Starting to wonder if GRJ isn't perhaps gaining a little from PLZ, capturing more pax between the two, especially Plettenberg Bay bound pax...maybe the petrol-price is slightly having an impact...?

cthighflyer

April 19th, 2012, 12:19 AM

Cant wait for Qatar to start flights to D:banana:urbs. Rumor has it they will make CT a direct flight with Durban via JNB in the beginning.

Durbs777

April 19th, 2012, 08:07 AM

I dunno.... I think if Qatar really wants to do well, they'll go direct to DUR. Best bet is to start with the A330-200s. They can draw more passengers in with that option, rather than via JHB..... Because really, if they're gonna tag along through the "holy shrine" of ORTIA, then whats the benefit to DUR passengers choosing over Emirates!
Thats probably why Etihad failed in CPT!

Plus from what i've seen at ORTIA in the last year or so, Qatar is still mixing it up between the 773s, 77Ls, and 332s...... maybe their schedule does display such, but surely they should learn from Emirates success in SA and commit to each city on its own merits.... because that's what the passengers want - to skip JHB!

annman

April 19th, 2012, 08:55 AM

^^ I believe you may be correct. Etihad, Qatar and Emirates compete directly with one another. If Emirates is going direct and their sister Gulf airline is not, their automatically at a huge disadvantage. I think carriers underestimate the Durbanites' and Capetonians' revulsion in being forced to go via ORTIA. I know many Capetonains that avoid having to go via Johannesburg like the plague, rather connecting on the other side.

In more news, the new DA run Plettenberg Bay (Bitou) council is already in the process of getting Plett Airport operational again after years of mismanagement and neglect. :) So, this may have a little bit of an impact of George from next year. However, this is probably even more worrying news for PE, as at least GRJ is coming off the front foot, PLZ the back foot and this airport being right between them. Plus, George has a shared regional economic growth strategy with Mossel Bay, Knysna and Plett.

The WC-Economic Development Partnership is focusing on the Garden Route and West Coast, GRJ could go from strength-to-strength. If PE does not get their economic house in order, this region just to the west could start sucking in potential investment (probably already has been). Their PAX numbers have me very worried about the commercial health of the western Eastern Cape. :ohno:

Ron2K

April 19th, 2012, 09:34 AM

^^ Isn't Plett strictly a GA field though?

annman

April 19th, 2012, 09:48 AM

^^ The article eluded to the want for scheduled flights... If it were so, I'd imagine it would be summer-seasonal SA-Airlink or SAX type flights.

Honestly, not sure; Think grjplanes could answer that question more accurately. ;)

grjplanes

April 19th, 2012, 11:44 AM

Yes, at the moment Plett is just GA. They have been mentioning the upgrade every now and then and believe that they can attract the numbers...but similarly do we here from other airports across the country every now and then...Saldanha, Bisho, Oudtshoorn, Margate etc. If it really materialises is another story. Personally I feel it's unnecessary, as they will definately not attract any low-cost airline like they claim they would in the short-term, otherwise we would have been seeing our low-cost airlines operating at more than just the current usual airports. If they get Airlink or SA Express, it would be at very high fares, catering just for the ultra-rich of Plett...but I doubt it would sustain a daily year-round service. No airline in South Africa currently only serves airports on a seasonal basis. Just like Airlink also used to serve Plett and Margate at reduced frequency throughout the year, just to have more flights over summer, it has become uneconomical for them. South Africa don't need airports at 100kms apart yet, more like 300kms apart is still viable, with the exception ofcourse being JNB and Lanseria for obvious reasons. Pietermaritzburg being quite close to DUR is also still do-able, as it serves a niche-market on an economical distance route to it's main market only (JNB), and can guarantee year-round demand as it is a provincial capital and reasonably populated.