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AECFA and New Tax starting 15th of September Standard

Aena logos at Barcelona airport / Lali Masriera

Last Tuesday 17th of June, Spanish Ministry of Fomento (Development) designated Asociación Española para la Coordinación y Facilitación de Franjas horarias (AECFA) as Slot Coordinator and Facilitator of the Spanish Airports within the Aenanet. Further to our post of 20th of January this change in the coordinator is in order to meet the European Regulation 95/93 about slot coordination in European airports which pretends an independent coordination from airlines and airports. The new association is primary made up of Aena (50%) and a number of airlines (50%): Iberia, Iberia Express, Vueling, Air Nostrum, Air Europa, Ryanair, Swiftair, Thomson Airways, Condor, Thomas Cook Airlines Ltd., Binter Canarias , Naysa and Canair The assignation of AECFA as Spanish coordinator and Mr….

Aena privatisation is confirmed Standard

Lufthansa takeoff shot from Barcelona airport terminal / Kozumel

Ana Pastor – Minister of Development – managed to succeed with her plans and they will finally go ahead with the Aena privatisation. Aena will make an initial public offering (IPO) this autumn. However, they will put on sale only 49% of the company instead of 60% as their Consulting Council of Privatisation (CCP) had recommended.A smaller part through the same privatisation system.The council of ministers reached an agreement last Friday. Thus, they confirmed the Aena privatisation will be distributed in two phases: 28% through an IPO, and 21% for a stable nucleus with at least three main shareholders. This is…

The Norwegian Madrid base is inaugurated Standard

Norwegian B737 LN-KKW at Madrid / Aero Icarus

Yesterday, lainformacion.com informed that the Norwegian Madrid Base was opened during a launch ceremony. Thus, the third European low cost airline starts their Adolfo Suárez Madrid base to operate seven direct routes. Norwegian has already got a base in Alicante, Barcelona, Málaga, Gran Canaria and Tenerife. They have now based two B737-800s in Madrid to cover their daily flights to London and Copenhagen – One frequency is being added to the Copenhagen flight. Also, they will fly to Stockholm, Oslo, Helsinki, Hamburg, Warsaw and Malta.Ms Ana Isabel Mariño – the Madrid councillor of employment, tourism and culture – attended this ceremony, together with…

Castellón airport to start operations this year (as well) Standard

Valencia Autonomous Region president presenting the Castellón airport project / PresidenciaGVA

According to LaVanguardia.com SNC-Lavalin confirmed the first commercial flight will operate in Castellón airport before the end of 2014. They foresee to have reached one million passengers per year in ten years.We had recently informed that Murcia-Corvera airport intend to start operations in 2014 as well. Probably both airports want to take benefit from the good figures of the Spanish airports in general, and Alicante in particular. Alicante gained passengers by 7.7% between January and April 2014 with regard to the same period of 2013. Alain Russel, chairman of SNC-Lavalin – the company to manage Castellón airport – said this during the presentation of the project for the Castellón…

The TCO Regulation effective as from today Standard

EASA logo

The Commission Regulation (EU) 452/2014, so-called TCO (Third Country Operator) Regulation, has entered into force today.The TCO Regulation was published in the Official Journal of the European Union on 6th May 2014 to be effective on 26th May.From now on and during the next six months, the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) is accepting from non-EU operators that intend to fly to EU territory, the formal applications for a TCO safety authorization that will be valid for the entire European Union. The TCO will be a precondition for obtaining the operating permit in each Member State, which will require a separate procedure.We will…

European Commission criticizes the opacity on Aena’s charges Standard

Madrid airport Terminal 4

Spanish Airports are not transparent enough with regard to airport charges.This is the main conclusion extracted from a report published on Monday by the European Commission about the implementation of the airport charges policy.The report also estates that Aena do not discuss with airlines the changes applied in this area, so they do not comply with the regulation.The Law in question, which came into force in 2011, requires airports to discuss regularly with airlines about the airport charges, particularly when they are going to be modified. They must also inform about the runways and terminal costs taken into account to…

EasyJet finalising a plan to open routes in Spain in 2015 Standard

Easyjet takeoff in Madrid airport / Javier Pedreira

The Spanish airports are increasing passengers in AprilAena published data for the April operations and confirmed the good trend so far in 2014. Only in April, the Spanish airports gained passengers by 9.3% with regard to April 2013. Comparing figures between January and April, the Spanish airports increased passengers by 4.1% so far this year.It is worth noting that Madrid increased passengers by 7.5% in April, experiencing an aggregate growth of 2.5%; Barcelona keeps the good numbers increasing by 10.8% in April (7.5% between January and April); Málaga met the expectations we had anticipated and grew by 14.4% in April (accumulating 9.5%); Alicante is…

New satellite navigation system available for landings at the Spanish airports Standard

Málaga ATC tower during the works

Last week Aena announced a new satellite navigation system is available for landings at the Spanish airports through a press release which translation follows: The GBAS system is already available at one Spanish airport Aena is worldwide leader in starting new technologies and introduces operations based on satellite navigation 05 May 2014 As from today, Aena offer the possibility of landing at a Spanish airport using a modern satellite navigation system which suppose a significant step with regard to safety, cost savings and effectiveness for the air transport users. This is the satellite navigation system named GBAS (Ground Based Augmentation…

Murcia-Corvera to start operations this year Standard

Jetair at Murcia-San Javier airport / Joaquin Vanschoren

The story of Murcia-Corvera airport looks like the never ending story but at last someone mentioned dates for the airport to start operations. We had learned that Sacyr and the Government of Murcia had resumed talks in December for Aeromur – owned by Sacyr – to get the airport’s concession. Five months later, there has been no news about this. In the meantime, Ramón Luis Valcárcel, president of the Autonomous Region for the last 19 years, in charge of such conversations, resigned to go to the European elections in the list of his political party (Partido Popular).The day before yesterday, VozPopuli informed that Alberto Garre – new…

Barcelona to start collecting the new green tax in July Standard

Barcelona expected to start collecting the new green tax in July

Green tax: Following with the new green tax in Barcelona airport for the commercial flights that we had anticipated, please see below further detail: The law is expected to come into force in July 2014. Therefore, the green tax will have to be paid from then onwards. Taxpayers are airlines or flight operators departing from Barcelona airport. Special flights such as emergency landings or humanitarian flights are exempted from this green tax. Position flights are not considered as commercial flights and hence are exempted too. This green tax is to be paid as from the 1st of January of the year after…