Expanding Airport Capacity in Large Urban Areas
Expanding airport capacity in large metropolitan areas is difficult. Community agreements
on noise constrain growth at existing airports. Land prices can be prohibitive for
relocating airports. Most new sites require extensive investment in surface transport
links to city centres. In multi-airport regions, options for expansion at the airports
are to an extent interdependent, complicating assessment of whether to build new runways.
Many major airports are hubs for network carriers at the same time as serving a large
local market. The complementarity between these functions may be a prerequisite for
viable network operations, suggesting that distributing services over multiple airports
instead of expanding the main hub would be costly. Hub airports and their network
carriers often compete with hubs in neighbouring regions. The strategies of network
carriers and potential new entrants to this part of the market need to be taken into
account in assessing future demand for airport capacity. The requirements of low cost
and other point-to-point carriers are equally important, but different.
This report reviews international experience in reconciling planning and environmental
constraints with demand for airport capacity and the potential benefits in terms of
productivity and growth from developing international airline services. Experience
is compared in London, New York, Tokyo, Osaka, Sydney and in Germany’s main airports
with particular attention to the dynamics of airline markets and implications for
airport planning in multi-airport cities.
Published on April 15, 2014
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