USD4.5 billion expansion of Madrid’s airports seeks to enhance Barajas' O&D and transfer potential

While some of Europe's older, legacy hubs ran out of momentum in the long haul connection market compared to the newer ones in the Middle East, one of the southernmost European ones, Madrid's Barajas Airport, has built a strong hub connecting Europe with Latin America, to the extent of being the biggest hub operator for those routes in the regional markets.

At the same time, Madrid, the Spanish capital, continues to make strides as a leading European capital city, vying with London and Paris for economic and touristic clout as Spain's economy - at least for now - outshines rival countries.

Traditionally though, Madrid has not been well connected directly with the Asia Pacific region. There is no colonial history to link it with most countries there, which might as well have been on the moon as far as the Conquistadores were concerned.

Now the latest expansion plan, running from 2027 to 2031, will seek to rectify that and other weaknesses by upgrading existing infrastructure to facilitate such connections, while not losing sight of the fact that Barajas has a significant 'low cost' business as well.

Potentially, the four runway, four terminal, facility could emerge as an even more competitive player in Europe than it is now, but that depends on factors such as to what degree the main airlines (principally IAG and Air Europa) step up to the plate, and how long the almost-unheard-of stability and high level performance of the Spanish economy continues.