BNE Passenger numbers continue to grow
Passenger numbers at Brisbane Airport continue to increase with more than 21.6 million international and domestic passengers travelling through BNE in FY13, a growth of 1.9 per cent or 407,000 additional passengers compared with FY12.
Highlights for the year include the arrival of two new carriers, Hawaiian Airlines and Philippine Airlines, as well as Thai Airways, Etihad Airways, Qantas and Malaysia Airlines increasing flights on certain routes to daily frequency.
These flights collectively adding a further 11 return international services to Brisbane every week. BNE also experienced a surge in domestic aircraft movements with an additional 270 scheduled flights added to the weekly schedule, resulting in an increase in seat capacity of 7.9 per cent or more than 1.65 million additional seats. Julieanne Alroe, Brisbane Airport Corporation (BAC) CEO and Managing Director, said the growth highlights the importance of providing additional runway capacity for airline partners. “Brisbane Airport’s new parallel runway will provide the infrastructure to service the needs of the travelling public for many decades to come. “BAC has already invested over $60 million into phase one site works for this major project which is due for delivery by 2020. “In the interim we are working with our partners to improve efficiency and increase the use of existing infrastructure. This includes collaborating with Airservices and our airline partners on a dedicated Airport Capacity Enhancement (ACE) program,” Ms Alroe said. Domestic Review Brisbane Airport achieved a year-on-year increase of 2 per cent in domestic passengers, up 332,000 passengers to 16.84 million. Contributing to this result was an increase in scheduled weekly flight frequency from 2,911 to 3,181, with a corresponding increase in seat capacity of 7.9 per cent or more than 1.65 million additional seats on offer across the domestic network. Illustrating the impact the resources industry is having on demand, there was a 20 per cent increase in intrastate flights, including Virgin Australia introducing three new routes between Brisbane and Mount Isa, Moranbah and Bundaberg. In terms of passenger volumes, the BNE-Gladstone route was the fastest growing, with an additional 107,000 passengers flying between the two cities.
October 2012 showed the highest monthly passengers, with volumes up over 93,000 from 2011 resulting in a new monthly domestic passenger record of over 1.5 million passengers. Capacity was also at its highest in October with over 258,000 extra seats on offer, coupled with discounting of airfares. The busiest day for domestic travel was during September 2012 with 61,372 arrivals and departures recorded on Friday 2, setting a new daily passenger record. The AFL and NRL grand finals on 29 and 30 September respectively and state school holidays contributed to this result. International Review International passenger volumes in FY13 were marginally higher than FY12 with a 1.6 per cent increase. Notable highlights for FY13 included the launch of Hawaiian Airlines direct non-stop flights between Brisbane and Honolulu three times weekly from November 2012, as well as the introduction of Philippine Airlines flying three times weekly from June 2013. United Kingdom visitor arrivals and departures and Australians heading overseas for the school holidays contributed to the busiest day for international travel on Sunday 23 June with almost 17,000 arrivals and departures recorded. The most popular international destinations among Australian residents departing Brisbane in FY13 were New Zealand accounting for 24 per cent of all departures, USA with 10 per cent, Fiji with 6 per cent and Thailand with 6 per cent. The fastest growing source market was China, with 15.9 per cent growth or 28,400 additional arrivals and departures. Visitor numbers from Europe grew by 5.1 per cent in FY13, reflecting the region’s gradual economic recovery. Outlook for 2013/14
BAC expects FY14 will be another busy year, with further capacity growth flagged by domestic and international carriers, including the launch of Garuda Indonesia’s Denpasar services in August and Emirates’ upgrade from B777-300ER aircraft to A380 aircraft on the Dubai – Brisbane – Auckland route from 2 October.
Drivers of inbound demand will include a busy calendar of local events, including the Ashes cricket series in Brisbane.
“We look forward to another busy year ahead with BAC continuing to plan for the future to meet the demands of expected passenger growth and focusing on works for the new runway, the launch of our Airport Master Plan, as well as over 50 civil, building and strategic planning projects across the airport,” Ms Alroe said.
