67 new European routes launched in last four weeks; Wizz Air leads way with 24 including 16 in Italy
In the last four weeks, we have identified 67 new routes involving European airports. These were started between 11 September and 8 October. A total of 28 airlines had something to celebrate with Wizz Air leading the way with 24 new services, nine of which were from its recently opened base in Naples. In total, 16 of Wizz Air’s new routes involved airports in Italy. The next most prolific airline for new route launches was Blue Air with five new routes; four from Milan LIN and one connecting London LHR and Nice.
With the recent opening to the public of the Dubai EXPO 2020, it is no great surprise to see Dubai featuring heavily among the recent batch of new routes. flydubai began four new routes to Europe, Wizz Air two with one each from airBaltic, LOT Polish Airlines and Lufthansa.
Istanbul to Dallas is longest new service
In among all the intra-European routes and new services to the Middle East (Abu Dhabi, Dubai and Sharjah), there were a handful of genuine long-haul routes. Leading the way (in terms of sector length) was Turkish Airlines’s new 4-weekly service to Dallas/Fort Worth (at 10,099 kilometres), followed by Eurowings Discover adding Mauritius to its Frankfurt network (9,176 kilometres). Then came World2fly’s Madrid to Havana service (7,475 kilometres) and JetBlue’s second transatlantic route between New York JFK and London LGW (5,583 kilometres). There were two new routes of less than 200 kilometres; BRA Braathens between Gothenburg and Aarhus (182 kilometres) and Ryanair’s Malaga to Tangier service (166 kilometres). Both involve flying over water.
Lots of activity in Italy
A total of 33 countries celebrated new routes involving European airports with Italy leading the way with 28, followed by Spain (14), the UAE (12) and the UK (10). At an airport level, the winner in this issue is Naples with 10 new routes just edging out Dubai with nine. Then comes Milan LIN with five, and Prague and Rome FCO with four each. A total of 85 different airports were involved in these 67 new routes. Looking ahead, the start of the winter season at the end of October is set to see a considerable number of new European routes.
