Small regional air transport in Germany and Europe: Scope for revitalization after years of decline?

Abstract

Unlike e.g. low cost air travel, regional aviation is only scarcely featured in the transportation research literature. This paper reflects and discusses the development, connectivity impact, and potential outlook of intra-European regional air services from Germany. First, we employ air transport supply data to illustrate the general decline of this market segment in the past 15 years and resulting connectivity losses for selected airports and regions. Second, we discuss potential drivers behind the observed trend, as well as possible starting points for a revitalization of regional air links, which could – at the same time – also help improving regional connectivity and the utilization (and financials) of small airports. We close the paper with a simple but straightforward exercise to quantify the demand potential for new, nonstop regional air services from Germany based on empirical indirect passenger flow data. From today’s perspective, we identify a potential for 313 new routes with a potential for 2.2 million passengers.