2016: a record-breaking year for Marseille Provence Airport, and great prospects for 2017!

The last 12 months have been particularly rich for the airport of France’s second city:  record turnover, passenger numbers and freight activity, as well as the first concrete signs of the major investment plan for structural improvements. Thanks to a healthy financial situation and new flight routes, the airport can look forward to a bright future with peace of mind.

 2016 has been a record-breaking year for passenger numbers, freight and turnover.

 In an international context marked by attacks, Brexit and many strikes in the air transport sector, 2016 was a new turning point for the Marseille Provence Airport in the completion of the objectives set in its strategic plan to 2025.

• From a financial point of view, the Marseille Provence Airport (AMP) increased its turnover by 3%, reaching 134 million euros (preliminary figures). As a result of this increase in turnover, the gross operating profit should progress by 3%. 

The debt level of AMP remains low this year, around 16 million euros, despite important investments in improvement works which began in 2016.

• The commercial activity of the Marseille Provence Airport reached a new record with 8,475,809 passengers.

This represents nearly 214,000 additional passengers compared with 2015, an increase of 2.6%.

While the number of commercial aircraft movements remained almost the same compared with 2015 at 90,817: +0.2%, a result of the airlines’ efforts to optimise the seat occupancy rate and use higher capacity aircraft.

The volume of national passengers represents 41% of the total volume, with 3,475,767.

International passenger volume reached 4,921,379 passengers in 2016, 59% of the total. Despite Brexit, London is still AMP’s top international destination, with an increase of 7% in 2016 and 551,331 passengers. Amsterdam climbs to second place on the podium, with an important increase of  20.5% to 307,559 passengers; at Algiers expense which dropped down to third place (288,275 passengers and -3.6%).

• The freight activity also registered an excellent performance, handling 55,900 tonnes (+7.1% compared with 2015).

Once again this increase is due to the express freight activity which increased by 7.8%, in particular thanks to DHL and Chronopost who reinforced their activities on the Provence hub in 2016.

These figures maintain Marseille Provence Airport at the top of the podium of French regional airports and the western Mediterranean region for express freight.

Very strong prospects for 2017

 The number of direct flights to European cities has doubled in the last 10 years, thanks in particular to low-cost airlines.

In keeping with this progression, 16 new routes have already been confirmed for the 2017 summer season (April to October) compared with summer 2016.

New destinations:

• Alicante, Split, Vienna with Volotea,
• Cagliari and Milan Linate with Meridiana
• Berlin and London Luton with easyJet
• Valencia with Ryanair

And new services, in addition to the range already proposed by other airlines:

• Algiers with Vueling (in addition to Aigle Azur, Air Algérie and Tassili Airlines).
• Faro with Ryanair (in addition to Volotea).
• Venice with Ryanair (in addition to Volotea).
• Casablanca with TUIfly (in addition to Royal Air Maroc).
• Monastir and Djerba with Nouvelair (in addition to Tunisair).

For long-haul flights, Air Austral makes a resounding comeback with two weekly flights to St. Denis in Reunion from 12 October 2017.

Air Canada will land at the airport for the first time and will fly to Montreal 3 times per week from 10 June to 14 October, whilst Air Transat increases its Montreal service to 5 flights per week. This is excellent news for the Provence population as Montreal, with many connections, is the ideal gateway to North America.

Thanks to these developments, AMP should beat a new record of passenger numbers in 2017, with an increase of 5%.

For the 2017 summer season, direct flights to 103 destinations will be offered from Marseille to 25 countries. A total of 150 scheduled routes will be serviced by 34 scheduled airlines.