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Major European airports which welcome GA...

I went to Leipzig Halle EDDP last week, and I was impressed by it's size: It is huge with two parallel runways of 3600m, 5 aprons, taxiways wider than most runways I have landed on, lots of cargo, etc.

Normally airports of this size discourage GA by charging huge sums for landing / handling. But Leipzig was very reasonable. For a DA40 I paid:

  • 10,85 EUR Landing fee
  • 5,76 EUR Parking fee
  • 8,00 EUR Infrastructur fee (not sure what that is)
  • 15,00 EUR Special Services BVD (I reckon these are handling costs?)

Both ATC and ground personal were very helpful and positive towards GA flying. Connection to the City Center is a very convenient 15 min. train ride (4.30 EUR via S-Bahn).

All in all a very positive experience!

So the question arise: Which other major European airports do welcome GA ?

Taxiway crossing a Motorway...

Crossing traffic on the taxiway...

Enormous empty GA apron...

Modern airport...

While EDDP is a very big airport (in terms of real estate), it's not really very busy in terms of scheduled traffic, and that's really the criterion to which we should relate the degree of "GA-friendliness".

Germany's major airports ("Verkehrsfughaefen") can actually be sub-divided into three broad categories.

"Group 1" are those that are super-busy with scheduled traffic and don't want any small GA traffic. Accordingly, they charge several hundreds for landing a 1.5 ton aircraft and alo impose various other restrictions. This group - fortunately - consists of only Frankfurt (EDDF) and Munich (EDDM) airports.

"Group 2" are those which are busy with scheduled-traffic and while they accept small GA without too many hassles and limitations, they do charge roughly 100 Euros for landing in order to limit the number of small GA movements to a sensible level. This "group" consists of Hamburg (EDDF), Berlin (EDDB), Stuttgart (EDDS), Duesseldorf (EDDL) and Cologne (EDDK).

"Group 3" are those airports which have a reduced amount of scheduled traffic and thus consider small GA as no particular nuisance (and accordingly, charge about 50 Euros or even significantly less for a landing). Leipzig is part of that group (as is Dresden, Hannover, Nürnberg, Saarbrücken, etc.). The "GA champion" of these is probably Hannover, whose manager is a GA pilot und does everything he can to attract small GA. But again, these airports are not really very busy with scheduled traffic, so they have no reason not to consider small GA a welcome part of their business target.

All in all, Germany compares rather favorably with other european countries. UK for expample has more like 8 airports that belong to "group 1" (i.e. fees well above 100 Euros).

It is no wonder that dutch pilots feel very good about visiting german major airports. Your minor airports cost more than most major airports in Germany! (Lelystad in particular comes to mind...)

Mainz (EDFZ) & Egelsbach (EDFE), Germany

I beg to differ... though not from personal experience, admittedly. But don't we hear reports of big airports, mainly in southern Europe, equally or even more deserted as Leipzig (which after all has a fair deal of cargo trafiic, though mostly at night, much to our convenience), but with absurdly high tariffs yet very poor service? Give me Leipzig a hundred times, then!

One answer to the original question that comes to my mind is EBOS Ostend, the one "big" airport in my country where my microlight isn't disallowed. To me it looks like expensive but I am used to a different scale. Then again, it doesn't really classify as a major airport, under most classification systems, either.

EBZH Kiewit, Belgium

I was mostly comparing german airports between each other.

I would have to think hard about any airports in Europe which have very limited scheduled traffic and still charge north of 100 Euros to a 1.5 ton aircraft.

But yes, in southern Europe, there are several very sleepy airports which offer a very poor service to GA. But in these cases, it is not because they want to discourage small GA in order to make room for scheduled traffic; it is because they don't know GA works or just don't care about it.

Mainz (EDFZ) & Egelsbach (EDFE), Germany

I would have to think hard about any airports in Europe which have very limited scheduled traffic and still charge north of 100 Euros to a 1.5 ton aircraft.

Well, you don't have to think too hard - most AENA airports in Spain now fall into this category. While this does make some sense for Madrid, Barcelona and Malaga, it's absurd for places like Seville, that have almost no CAT. Until a few years ago, Spain was paradise for landing fees - except Madrid and Barcelona (which are off-limits to SEP anyway, AFAIK), landing fees were around 11 EUR. Then the crisis hit and they decided to hike their prices, in some cases more than 10-fold if you include the mandatory handling. The Spanish way of attracting customers......

After a couple of confusions, I discovered that many airports, large or small, would surreptitiously overcharge you unless you prove your entitlement to a lower rate and/or explicitly ask not to be billed for what you don't need. Now, before flying to a new destination (or one I haven't visited in a long while), I always e-mail or call the airport office and ask for a calculation of fees for the following set of conditions:
- SEP aircraft with MTOW of XXXX kg
- Arrival: VFR or IFR as applicable (possibly ask for both options)
- Non-revenue GA flight, no paying passengers, no cargo (both inbound and outbound), [fuel stop only - if applicable]
- Valid noise certificate, noise category X
- No handling, I say again, no handling, pleeeease
- Will be buying fuel
- Off-peak hours, [daytime - if applicable], or arriving at HHMM / departing at HHMM
- Will accept grass RWY (or GA-only RWY) if it makes a difference

If I overlooked any important items, please add!

LKBU (near Prague), Czech Republic

The UK's problem is that you are required to have full ATC for any instrument approach.

Full ATC, even for daytime only cover, costs some large part of £1M/year by the time it has been fully costed.

If we could have US-style remotely located approach controllers, that would be great, but that won't work either because the body employing that controller is going to be charging too much per approach, or per year, etc.

So the UK airfields that don't have IAPs (which in most if not all cases don't have ATC either) are never going to get them - until some radically different system is accepted.

I would have to think hard about any airports in Europe which have very limited scheduled traffic and still charge north of 100 Euros to a 1.5 ton aircraft.

Well, that is true, but €100 is going to stop perhaps 99% of GA traffic. Only business travellers, "jokers" who want to pay 3 figures for an unusual logbook entry (e.g. those who paid ~ €700 to get EGKK in there) and weather diversions by pilots who put safety over money, are going to land there. Look at Prague LKPR - up from ~ €50 in 2005 (and loads of GA planes parked there) to €200 in 2013 (just 1, and me).

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

it's absurd for places like Seville, that have almost no CAT.

I visited Granada, Cordoba and Seville last two weeks, Granada and Seville charged around 30€ including 4 days parking, Cordoba less. I don't find this absurd.

Landing fees aren't the problem in Spain, the problem is mandatory handling in places like Jerez.

LSZK, Switzerland

I visited Granada, Cordoba and Seville last two weeks, Granada and Seville charged around 30€ including 4 days parking, Cordoba less. I don't find this absurd.

How did you do that ?? Especially curious about Seville. Cordoba is non-AENA, therefore OK, and Granada has not - yet - hiked the fees beyond reason. But Seville? Perhaps they've seen the light....

Munster Osnabruck last Saturday charged me a scandalous €10,47 including tax for a night vfr arrival. That included one night parking. No charge for runway lighting. The ATC charge will add another €10. By contrast the landing (day) at Lelystad on Sunday will be €47,00.

EHLE / Lelystad, Netherlands, Netherlands
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