LeSving your comparison to a burger restaurant is faulty and you know it.
Airports, no matter who runs them, are in the end part of the transport infrastructure just like roads and railroads are. The very fact that some of them are without alternative if you want to reach the place by air (this applies to most airports on islands, most famously in Greece and Spain) makes it imperative and logical that anti-monopoly laws apply. These airports have an undisputed monopoly if they’re the only ones on the island. For various reasons (lack of available land, efficiency, bureaucracy) you can’t just open a rival airport and let the free market do its magic, as would happen in case of your 1000€ burger restaurant.
This has nothing to do with ideology, and the fact that the free market extremists of the US seem to have understood this better than many allegedly social democratic nations in Europe is a dead giveaway.
I am not a great fan of price regulations, but there are places where they are simply needed. In my opinion the discussion about principles of regulations is a bit off sense now, as we have already contracted the professionals for that. The goal is to stop arrogant prices at constant growing number of airports. The chosen tool – anti monopoly regulations of EU.
I really hope that we will succeed. Personally I am of the opinion that there are substantial forces against GA, that were not present in the previous decades. We have an expansion of cheap airliners, that are the blessing for regional airports. We used to be friends of these airports, but they are having new masters now. If nothing changes – the way of our flying (touring around Europe for business or leisure) – is poised to die. Greece is lost, Spain looks like soon also, UK with number of issues and even from Sweden (no problem country previous years) we start getting “offers” of 800 Euro for landing with short stay. And a number of local examples from other countries.
Small airfields are not in jeopardy, but anything bigger, what is in the interest of airliners – under the current legal frames can be lost for our flying at any point in time. And in majority of cases without any objective reasons, capacity issue (although applicable in some places) – is usually just a smoke blanket…
So please let’s stop theoretical discussions in this plot, please use it in the way Emir or Buckerfan do.
Please send me some relevant documents and let’s talk only about such here.
MedEwok wrote:
These airports have an undisputed monopoly if they’re the only ones on the island.
I copy-paste a recent CAT passenger report about the Fraported only airport of the island I live:
…"airport is a very poor airport and can make your trip a nightmare, whether arriving or departing. It is way too small to hold the international flights it does; it’s cramped, boiling and very old. With one small door (‘the gate’) out to the apron, if there are multiple flights departing with similar departure times, the entire departure lounge becomes a heaving and extremely stressful room, full of rude tourists.(Bearing in mind that i visited not in peak season)! There really needs to be improvements made but airports like that simply do not have the budget to do so. Unfortunately, the airport is very unpleasant. "
After having to sell off my 172,abandon flying and let my License to expire,I further despise to even drive to the airport,to search like crazy a parking place,to endure the Venezulean queues,to suffer the stupidity of security rituals and being stuck in a big room with another 1000 dehydrated passengers.Conditions worsened now, since the 7
stands became 10.
I now travel to Athens by boat.It takes 12 hours but it is luxurious,and the single cabin+restaurants cost less.
Today I got some interesting invoice from Wiliam, from EHEH, 350 Euro for landing and handling of Cirrus. Could someone please comment if this is something extraordinary for Eindhoven, or rather typical for Holland?
That is a typical price for a SEP at any of the “London” airports e.g. Luton, Stansted, Gatwick is more like €700 last I heard (some years ago). These are due to handling cartels of e.g. Signature and Harrods Handling.
I emailed you all old invoices I could find, including one from LGKR which was about 1/10 of what it is today.
The comparison with Luton, Stansted and Gatwick is less optimal as it could be argued that there are suitable alternatives available, although there is an availability issue in terms of LPV approaches. I think also in the US one would not insist on landing at JFK, EWR or BOS but there are generally more than enough suitable IFR alternates available.
Overall there is the question whether the legal argument of monopolistic abuse and vertical product bundling should and can be made for all airports or only for those for which no suitable alternative exists.
On a separate note, is it wise to discuss legal strategy in an open forum? Would it make sense to have a private forum for that?
Bart wrote:
d someone please comment if this is something extraordinary for Eindhoven, or rather typical for Holland?
It is unfortunately typical for a provincial airport, wishing to price out GA and bring in – for them – the more lucrative, RuinAir type of operations. Holland is slightly more expensive than Germany but these sorts of pricing can be found everywhere – in the case of Germany, if you want to land at, say, Köln Bonn (EDDK), you will pay at least the same amount. But fly to EDDG, the bill is maybe 12€.
Not sure if these are super pricey:
Riga (EVRA) handling was 150-200eur. Totalling roughly 200-250 eur per landing.
Tallinn (EETN) the total bill goes to over 100eur, handling is roughly 70 eur with all items added.
Not at the most expensive end, but paying that for a 5 min car ride doesn’t feel right.
Handling can be “regulated” by the airport by stating it must match the expenses it creates. Getting a small plane to outskirts of the airport with some work done by a local marshaller and car driver is not surely worth hundreds. There is plenty of space in many airports and they could get more GA traffic easily. You can limit the prices by MTOW etc. If the airports want to get rid of small planes, then a good way is to get the handling super expensive. The landing fees are sensible and this is what they call tell everyone if challenged ;)
Peter, Pehu, David, Greg – thank you very much for the invoices examples you sent to me.
Forwarded to the legal team.
Steve6443 – are you sure about EDDK? I checked it with the eddh.de, the other pireps of below 2T are around 100 Euro… True that last wast from y.2017, but would be great to hear from you some more detail, either here or at [email protected]
wbardorf wrote:
is it wise to discuss legal strategy in an open forum?
Bart wrote:
Steve6443 – are you sure about EDDK? I checked it with the eddh.de, the other pireps of below 2T are around 100 Euro…
This is based on a quote I received for landing around 1am on 1st January after a night flight over the Ruhr Valley to watch the Fireworks from above but it showed the distinct difference in pricing – I paid I think around €45 all in for 3 touch and goes, parking and landing at 1am in Paderborn. I will see if I can dig out that quote.
