As to the original question, don’t make the mistake of landing at Mallorca’s main airport. Minimum fee 600 euros or so. Well, if you are a C152 it’s free, just turn of your transponder and don’t talk. They won’t spot you 
As to how controllers treat light GA, it really varies. First by season of the year, second by individual.
In summer, traffic to the island and neigbouring Ibiza and Menorca is very dense as you can imagine. I go to ibiza regularly, but expect delays. As to things like crossing the Palma’s main airport’s CTR, you can do it but I don’t, unless there would be a real need, for instance due to weather. These people are very busy and no sense adding to their workload just for the fun of being right overhead that big place.
In winter I find controllers to be very accomodating to light GA. While on a VFR plan you can just show up near any ILS approach area and ask for one. 8 out of 10 they allow you. The 9th time they’ll ask you if you are prepared to hold for a few minutes. Then, once established, they ask you whether you want do do a low pass (ehh, sorry, missed approach, will wash my mouth with soap after I post this) or if you want to make 90 degree towards home base (Son Bonet). All free of charge, in case you make sure your wheels don’t touch the ground. If you do, even a Bose A20 won’t be good enough to filter out that large cash register sound. When going to Ibiza in winter on a VFR plan I sometimes ask for an ILS, and it is never denied. They may ask you to speed it up, and will even ask plane behind to slow down..
Differences by individual. Unfortunately quite large.. More than I have ever encountered in other European countries. I’ve been forced to hold in the pattern in Ibiza where they could have very comfortably slotted me in. But very good controllers to who asked me ‘if I’d be ready to do an immediate take-off behind the landing airliner and the one on x miles final, provided I make a direct left turn after being airborne’.
And when I confirmed he informed the one on approach ‘to expect a light aircraft departure and reduce to minimum speed’. Now, suddenly I felt important for once in my life 
Of course the english language can be an issue. The ability widely varies. No big deal if all goes according to standard protocol, but when something unusual happens…
So, just a bit of antidote to those who may think all is bad the further you go south(west) in Europe.
@Peter 21-Nov-15 13:46 #25
I am sure this is very true but it leads to the Q of why does GA interfere if there is one CAT movement per hour."
There is an inverse relationship between volume of traffic and ATCs ability to deal with GA. I soloed on Crete & recall getting blown out of the circuit to let an airbus land. I flew over to Knossos to take a look from the air while I waited and waited. About 30 minutes later the plane landed. Southern Europe seems worse. Eastern Europe and the Baltic want to keep GA at the fields, but some places you feel as if you’ve interrupted a siesta or someone’s session with a mistress.
C210_Flyer wrote:
Actually what Silvaire is saying on multiple runways is possible and I have been involved with that at any of the larger airshows AOPA
It still doesn’t “count” when there are no heavy traffic by scheduled flights.
Shorrick_Mk2 wrote:
Shorrick_Mk2 23-Nov-15 19:47 #47
One landing a minute? I am impressed Silvaire. If nobody takes off that’s… what, 600 planes over ten hours. Where do you park them all? I assume there’s either no heavy traffic or all of the day’s 600 arrivals are cleared for a visual approach right?Or maybe it isn’t really “one a min
Actually what Silvaire is saying on multiple runways is possible and I have been involved with that at any of the larger airshows AOPA, Sun and Fun as prime examples. There is no reason it can not happen here. The controllers just need training. I suppose the pilots as well, to get things done. Someone said it, be flexible. If you cant be flexible you have no business being in that airspace.
What drives me nuts is to wait 5 mins for an airliner that is on final when Im VFR and ready to go immediately. Yes that happens in the US more than I care to think. But usually only at airports that dont have much traffic so the tower guy dosent have the pace of things worked out yet.
Let me know where to sign…
What do you think about using “competition and customer protection” bodies that exist in every EU country for trying to prevent such behavior from the side of airports? When I have some time I will give it a try, here in Poland it is enough to have few dozens of complaints from individuals to start a formal investigation. Usually after a few months this ends with favorable ruling protecting people and companies are ordered the change the policies (and fined if they don’t).
At the beginning the nearby EPWR, where they have separate terminal for GA traffic and over 100 Euro mandatory handling that gets you 50 m from GA apron to the terminal building…
Similar to the USA, I have found that Canada is quite flexible in mixing the traffic. For example, when learning tail wheel, I could get permission for multiple touch and go’s on a long runway (6 or 7 per pass), in between the passenger jets at a large airport. We would obviously try to arrange our circuit so that we were on downwind as the jets land, but it all worked out.
At the field where I learned to fly, there were 155 000 movements per year, which is 424 per day! No landing fees and no problems with ATC. Admittedly, sometimes it would be, “you are number 7 behind the….”One landing a minute? I am impressed Silvaire. If nobody takes off that’s… what, 600 planes over ten hours. Where do you park them all?
Averaged over the year, it is around 600 operations per day with limited night time traffic. I have timed landings during good weather and it’s about 1 landing aircraft/minute on two parallel runways combined, plus some helicopter operations. Takeoffs are roughly equivalent in number. There are about 750 aircraft based on the field in their own storage areas, comprising a good portion of the traffic, plus two largely empty transient tie down areas. A fair portion of the operations are touch and goes.
The size of aircraft is limited by the runway length being roughly a mile, but some use it all. I fly off the same runway in both a light aircraft, and (as a passenger) in small and mid-size business jets, which are invariably IFR.
@peter actually at busy single-runway airports you will get strings of evenly spaced arrivals for quite a long time depending on the time of the day – the arrival spacing will take into account departures as well, so they won’t be spaced at minimum wake separation on the glideslope. It has happened to me to be requested to hold anywhere between ten and fifteen minutes in Geneva.
One landing a minute? I am impressed Silvaire. If nobody takes off that’s… what, 600 planes over ten hours. Where do you park them all? I assume there’s either no heavy traffic or all of the day’s 600 arrivals are cleared for a visual approach right?
Or maybe it isn’t really “one a minute…”….
