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Greek Airports (being sold to FRAPORT in Germany) and many new problems

I see speculation that the proposal by the Greek government will include

Selling off state assets including airports and ports

Reference

Obviously this is speculation at this stage. But I was wondering are most of the airports in Greece state owned, or most private? Obviously private ownership could have mixed blessings for GA. Less complaints of empty aprons being full, but perhaps a tighter focus on scheduled traffic at GA’s expense.

EIWT Weston, Ireland

Fraport (the company operating Frankfurt and some other airports around the world) entered into an agreement last year already: http://www.fraport.com/en/press-center/reports—-publications-/archive/2014/fraport-consortium-wins-tender-for—14-greek-regional-airports-.html

Fortunately (for me) Heraklion LGIR is not among them. Heraklion (H24, IFR, port of entry, etc.) costs 1.67 € landing free for which they employ a lot of staff to calculate and take a lot of time to do it every time, with 3 carbon copies on a dot matrix printer (not joking!) — no matter how often one’s been there. I guess this would change a lot after privatization, maybe not the efficiency but surely the 1.67 €.

The guy who handled me in Kerkyra about 5 years ago told me that the first thing that changed after privatization was that they added another form for him to fill duplicating the info on the other 5 forms

LSZK, Switzerland

Just wait untill Monday about these issues .

LGGG

Let’s hope that Fraport does not take over Greek Airports. That would be the end of fun for light GA. I don’t know of any Fraport airport where you can land a small SEP for less than 150€.

Mainz (EDFZ) & Egelsbach (EDFE), Germany

With the exception of Athens Intl. LGAV which is private (with some state shares) all the rest are still state owned and managed but with 3 appointed private handlers taking care of airside operations. ( http://www.aopa.gr/info para 12).

LGAV welcomes GA but the light GA prices (incl. handling) vary from 30~60 Euro for transit (e.g. only Greece entry/exit & refuel and go) or 200+ for accessing landside to embark or disembark pax.
Overnight is I think another 30~50 per day.
These are the prices expected after privatization (I guess a bit cheaper for the rest off Athens) but then you will be treated as valuable respected customer (as in LGAV) and not a nuisance.

The to be privatized airports come in packages with one main profitable one and 2~3 remote “loss” making ones per package.

As far as I’ve heard they all come in 5~6 packages for all Greek airports and Fraport (with a mixed deal with a Greek company) is the main contender with some others having pulled out long time ago.

So indeed wait till next week for further news but for GA the feelings are mixed. We will get what we deserve (if it goes ahead) but at a a price.

LGMG Megara, Greece

News in a German aviation magazine today. Link

It says Fraport will very shortly take over the operation of 14 Greek airports, such as Santorini, Mykonos, Corfu and Kos. In other words: most of the bigger civil ones. Goodbye to cheap handling and landing fees.

Maybe there will at least be some positives. I could think of:
-less insane opening hours
-more expeditious landing fee / handling fee payment
-maybe the end of the de facto closure of Mykonos for GA in summer

Last Edited by boscomantico at 22 Mar 20:11
Mainz (EDFZ) & Egelsbach (EDFE), Germany

boscomantico wrote:

Goodbye to cheap handling and landling fees.

Isn’t this precisely the kind of matter for AOPA to negotiate? After all, expensive landing/handling for light aircraft is not exactly a money-making or loss-limiting decision, it’s more about someone’s whim. A shrewd lawyer may even frame it up as an abuse of the dominant market position, if Fraport (or whoever else) is indeed to take over a lot of airports.

LKBU (near Prague), Czech Republic

Ultranomad wrote:

Isn’t this precisely the kind of matter for AOPA to negotiate?

AOPA in Greece have already had two meetings with Fraport representatives. All achieved up to now, and it was difficult, is an establishment of a communication corridor. No commitments, no information input on GA policy, nothing yet.

@Ultranomad you have a point but this is not a takeover, the airports are sold by the state. The future will show if lawyers will need to get to work or whether Fraport will have some reasonable prices for the service we (GA) will receive as a “client” and not as an unavoidable nuisance.

Postponements after postponements have brought the next date of airports handover to first week of April.
Fraport personnel are already in some airport offices but noone can confirm yet if the April date will be the one or if it will be postponed further.

LGMG Megara, Greece
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