Global Airport Outlook 2020: Growth to resume, modestly

As a new decade dawns Airline Leader examines some of the issues facing airports and some of the opportunities open to them.

They include the continuing advance of the low cost segment, consolidation in the full service segment, privatisation or the lack of it, car parking revenues and the threat they face, air versus rail and air+ rail, the prospects for private terminals, technological advances and the problems they can create, the continuing impact of the 'sharing community', UAVs, developments in security and, not least, the seething hatred towards the entire sector that is being generated by eco-warriors.

What sort of traffic will airports handle in the new decade?

As numbers of first time flyers increase, it is not unreasonable to expect there will be more Low Cost Carrier (LCC) capacity, around the world.

LCCs offer the prices (or at least the expectation of prices) and convenience which new entrants to the 'middle class' demand. The growth of this segment has continued in 2019.

The percentage of global LCC capacity (seats) rose from 32.5% to 32.9% between 2018 and the first 10 months of 2019 in the category 'within regions' and from 12.7% to 13.7% in the category 'to/from regions', in both the cases the highest budget sector impact ever recorded.