The International Air Transport Association (IATA) has raised alarms about the growing airport capacity crunch, which threatens the freedom of travel and constrains economic growth.
With airport infrastructure struggling to keep pace with increasing demand, IATA has released a White Paper proposing reforms to slot regulations to incentivize airports to maximize capacity from existing infrastructure.
Currently, nearly 400 airports worldwide are unable to meet the demand for air connectivity and require slot coordination under the IATA Worldwide Airport Slot Guidelines. If current trends continue, this number could increase by 25% over the next decade.
In Europe, the situation is particularly dire. Airports Council International (ACI) Europe predicts that by 2050, airport infrastructure will be unable to meet up to 12% of demand. Political constraints make large-scale airport developments, such as new runways, unlikely, further undermining Europe’s competitiveness. The Draghi report has already highlighted significant underperformance in this area. Therefore, airports must adopt best practices to maximize capacity from existing infrastructure.
“The only solution for insufficient capacity is construction. However, with large-scale projects like new runways or terminals being politically unfeasible in many regions, we must extract every possible unit of capacity from our current infrastructure. While some airports set strong benchmarks for maximizing capacity, many fail to follow the Worldwide Airport Slot Guidelines,” said Nick Careen, IATA’s SVP for Operations, Safety, and Security.
The newly published IATA White Paper on airport slots calls for stronger obligations on airports to maximize capacity.
“Under current slot regulations, airlines must efficiently utilize their granted slots or face penalties for cancellations or schedule deviations. However, airports face no penalties if they fail to deliver promised capacity. There is little pressure on them to meet global efficiency benchmarks, and often, there is insufficient transparency in their capacity declarations. This imbalance needs to be addressed so that both airports and airlines are equally committed to maximizing the social and economic value of airport capacity,” Careen added.
IATA’s proposed modifications to slot regulations include:
1. Requiring airports to regularly review their capacity declarations and implement a meaningful capacity consultation process to ensure greater transparency and identify neglected capacity increases.
2. Obligating airports to improve and increase capacity where possible, benchmarked against global best practices.
3. Imposing consequences if declared capacity is not delivered as promised.
“The current slot regulations have helped create a global air transport network that delivers increasing connectivity, consumer choice, and lower fares. To continue these benefits, we need performance obligations on airports. Stronger regulation is necessary to close the gap between the best and mediocre airports in delivering capacity. This will provide better service to passengers, greater accessibility to air transport, and more benefits to the world,” Careen concluded.
