Record year for Singapore air traffic
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Singapore’s Changi Airport overcame a difficult year to set new records for passenger traffic and aircraft movements in 2015.
According to the full-year data from the Changi Airport Group (CAG), the airport handled 55.4 million passengers and 346,330 landings and take-offs during the year, representing growth of 2.5% and 1.4% respectively.
The growth in 2015 was driven by rising demand for flights to and from Thailand (+12.5%), Vietnam (+7.2%) and China (+7.0%), which offset a downturn in traffic to and from Indonesia (-7.3%) and Hong Kong (-1.2%).
In terms of Changi’s busiest routes, Jakarta continued to top the list with 3.79m passenger movements, followed by Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Hong Kong and Manila. Bangkok was Changi’s second fastest growing major route, followed by Colombo, Guangzhou, Mumbai and Tokyo.
Changi welcomed four new passenger airlines last year – Air New Zealand, Batik Air, Thai Lion Air and Myanmar National Airlines – and added eight new destinations: Changchun, Quanzhou, Sanya, Yinchuan, Cairns, Lucknow, Luang Prabang and Pattaya.
CAG’s CEO, Lee Seow Hiang, said 2015 was a “year of two halves for Changi Airport”.
“Following 2014, which saw a number of airline incidents in the region and depressed yields for many regional carriers, we had a relatively weak first six months with flat growth for the period,” he said.
“Nevertheless, we pressed on to actively woo new airlines and seek growth opportunities with existing ones, and our efforts have yielded some positive outcomes. We have seen both full-service and low-cost carriers add capacity in recent months and this has resulted in stronger passenger growth of about 5% for the second half of the year.”
Moving forward, Lee said that economic uncertainty “may dampen travel demand in the near term”. But he added that Changi will be boosted by the launch of new flights, including Singapore Airlines’ new services to Dusseldorf, Canberra and Wellington, and the arrival of Fiji Airways’ new direct service from Nadi.
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