Page 57 - UKRRptMar19

61,691; Turkish up 9% to 29,972; Belavia up 10% to 16,003; and LOT Polish up 24% to 15,813. Ryanair launched flights last fall and was not counted in the year-on-year comparisons.
Kyiv Boryspil’s 19.4% passenger growth rate last year was the highest of any European airport of its class , 10 to 25mn passengers. According to Airports Council International Europe, runners up were: Moscow Vnukovo -- +18.4%; Budapest -- +13.5%; Warsaw Chopin --+12.8%; and St Petersburg -- +12.1%. By comparison, the average growth rate for non-EU European airports last year was +8.3%. Boryspil handled 12.6mn passengers last year. With more growth expected, Boryspil reopens Terminal F in April.
To offer a Kyiv region alternative for air cargo, Bila Tservka airport is to win international status in May and is to receive international cargo flights in August, Minister Omelyan tells reporters. Noting the airport is 80 km south of Kyiv’s Ring Road, near the E95 Kyiv-Odesa highway and near rail lines, Omelyan says the goal is to turn Bila Tserkva into an “international multimodal transport hub.” Airport director Sergei Kandaurov predicts the airport will handle 15 cargo flights a month this fall. A maintenance hub for four Ukrainian airlines, the airport did repairs last year on 73 aircraft, largely Antonovs. Last year, an EU expert study recommended the government spend $63mn through 2022 to turn the airport into a hub for cargo and discount airlines.
To cope with booming air cargo, Boryspil starts work in May on a new cargo terminal designed to more than triple handling capacity to 100,000 tons, Pavel Ryabikin, general director, tells reporters. Ideally, the terminal, will be partially open in time for this year’s Christmas rush. During the recent Christmas period, the airport was so overwhelmed with packages that it closed for air cargo for two weeks. Given air cargo growth rates, Minister Omelyan predicts this expansion will only be sufficient through 2022.
This summer, Vinnytsia starts a two-year, $78mn rebuild designed to make the central Ukraine airport capable of handling Boeing 767s . Resurfacing the runway and installing new lighting are part of the makeover, Mykola Bozhko, of the Infrastructure Ministry, tells reporters. Ukraine’s 11th busiest airport, Vinnytsia handled 61,000 passengers last year, largely on UIA flights to Kyiv and Tel Aviv and charters to Egypt. SkyUp starts charter flights to Antalya, Turkey on May 1.
Southern Ukraine’s Kherson airport has the best growth prospects for a regional airport in 2019 . After passenger traffic grew last year by 69%, to 106,000, airport officials released their development plan to the centre for Transportation Strategies. The airport lists 20 ‘promising destinations’ and targets Belavia and five discount airlines: Wizz Air, Ryanair, Ernest, Pegasus and Moldova’s FlyOne. In addition to talks with Wizz Air and Ryanair, work is underway to create a Kherson-based low cost carrier. Omelyan says “four to five” passenger jets would be based at the airport, the gateway to a dozen increasingly popular Black Sea resorts.
This spring, works starts on Prydniprovye, the new regional airport designed to serve Dnipro, Zaporizhia and Kriviy Rih , Omelyan tells the American Chamber of Commerce. By 2022, the airport could handle 1.5-2mn passengers. This volume would place it among Ukraine’s top five airports. Dnipro and Zaporizhia airports will stay open. But Omelyan cited Poland, which invested in two large airports 80 km apart. The rival airports cannibalized each
57 UKRAINE Country Report March 2019 www.intellinews.com