WhiskeyPapa wrote:
The Greeks will allow a competitor island to emerge. Syros? I do hope Sitia remains unoccupied.
From a recent conference AOPA Greece held in Athens where Egnatia Aviation (the most active Flight School up north in Kavala LGKV) presented the problem of inability to develop further airports while private ones are in operation.
They are greatly hit by FRAPORT costs in their base Kavala LGKV.
Airports accessible by GA and GA airfields in Greece
Their listing
The radius of 100 Km from FRAPORTs and Athens Int’l where according to the airports’ contract with the state, no other or new airport is allowed to be constructed or revamped during the contract period.
You can see that the radius leaves almost no options. The center North-South axis of mainland Greece is with terrain, no options there too.
Peter wrote:
And if say there are CAT-busy times during the day, I would sell the remaining time on a website
In this context it’s also worth noting that most southern European airports (certainly the Spanish ones) have ‘waves’ of CAT coming from northern Europe with totally dead times in between.
The radius of 100 Km from FRAPORTs and Athens Int’l where according to the airports’ contract with the state, no other or new airport is allowed to be constructed or revamped during the contract period.
Outrageous but unsurprising that Fraport got an anti-competitive clause put in. Greece must have been well and truly over a barrel to agree on such a checkmate though. How long is the contract for?
What constitutes a “development”? Installing an avgas pump, for example?
I would think Egnatia must be looking to move to Alexandropolis…
In this context it’s also worth noting that most southern European airports (certainly the Spanish ones) have ‘waves’ of CAT coming from northern Europe with totally dead times in between.
I am sure that’s true for virtually all “really busy” airports. Gatwick has loads of quiet times. Heathrow much less so, I am told. But it takes a bit of imagination on the management part.
One might hope Fraport made some mistake with their policy increasing prices right after take-over of last year. And once they learn better the operations and local situation of particular fields – that they will find a way of some better fitting CAT and GA.
But it is exactly opposite, after some probing now the course is to get rid of GA at all. It looks that ther still are countries where Fraport “behaves”, but in Greece they do not care at all, just executing own strategy. It does not matter much if the optimum one or not (from our perspective…), it is simply the one chosen by themselves, on public airports infrastructure.
And I am more than sure that this cancer will find number of mutations and followers…
The simple exercise would be to name airports where you are no longer flying, as they became too expensive…
One will easily see how advanced is this tumor in Europe. And it is just the beginning.
I would not know of any place where Fraport behaves. As the name sais, their homebase is Frankfurt Rhein Main, one of the first airports to price out GA decades ago. For them, this is the normal modus operandi.
The big problem I see in Greece however is the total lack of alternatives. In most other places there are plenty GA airports and airfields around which mean that GA can still reach the general area without having to rely on a Fraport or otherwise controlled airliner’s airport. In Greece that is different. Most places only have one airport on the islands particularly. And in this case, the Fraport outpricing means that most islands and large parts of the mainland are now GA-No Go areas.
That is totally unacceptable. Airports are infrastructure FIRST and profit center second, particularly where they are in practice the lifeline for places like islands.
As for the Greek government having been over a barrel to agree to this, one should not forget that they are Socialists. And socialists/communists are the natural enemies of GA or at least they could not care less about them and in all fairness, with the problems they are facing, it is no wonder that GA did not have any sort of priority when it came to contract making with Fraport. Most socialists in Greece most probably don’t even know they had a GA. They need cash, large quantities of and fast and the only real industry they have is mass tourism. So it is obvious that they put their priorities into that.
Most probably, the only way out would be to either take this matter to court or to develop small airports in the vicinity of the Fraport airports or, where the airport in question is big enough, declare part of it a GA sector where Fraport has no jurisdiction. But that will be difficult and possibly impossible due to the conditions there.
Mooney_Driver wrote:
either take this matter to court
Not even to court. The first stage would probably be the Hellenic Competition Commission. Or, in fact, any other national competition authority of the EU if that country has enough GA operators disgruntled by Fraport’s predatory practice.
Peter wrote:
What constitutes a “development”? Installing an avgas pump, for example?
Bart wrote:
. It looks that ther still are countries where Fraport “behaves”,
Mooney_Driver wrote:
socialists/communists are the natural enemies of GA
MedFlyer wrote:
when these guys learned about my old C172 purchase,I lost them for ever as clients.Envy is the word.
For real? Would not surprise me, I remember how some folks reacted when I bought my old Mooney. it was that or a new car but I could not afford the car 
The claim that “socialists” are “the natural enemies of GA” is obvious nonsense. For one thing there is no ideological reason why that should be the case, also I personally know socialists who are not opposed to GA as well as liberals/conservatives who are.
On the other hand “with the problems [the Greek] are facing, it is no wonder that GA did not have any sort of priority when it came to contract making with Fraport” is very likely true.
Jujupilote wrote:
If they see all their GA business going elsewhere, they could react.
Peter wrote:
Having ATC sitting there doing nothing and costing probably €1M/year is very bad management.
