Air-rail links set to take off as flight traffic levels soar

Date: 14/12/00

By Renée Cordes

AS TRANSPORT chief Loyola de Palacio works to relieve congestion in Europe's crowded skies, airports are investing huge sums to improve traffic conditions on the ground.

With some help from Union coffers, several airports are developing high-speed or conventional rail links to improve access for flight passengers. But not everyone is taking advantage of the opportunities to improve service.

An overwhelming majority of the 23 airport operators from ten EU countries surveyed recently by Airports Council International (ACI) have completed or are still carrying out projects aimed at boosting acccess through public transport. The hope is that in the long run, large international hubs and even second-tier airports will be able to lure more passengers from further away.

But rather than adding to traffic in the sky, airports are trying to do the opposite: some short-haul flights are being reduced or eliminated altogether and diverted onto the rails, opening up precious take-off and landing slots. "Airports are getting more and more congested," says Hans Ollongren, director of European and public affairs at Scandinavian Airline System (SAS) in Brussels. "If you can link high-speed trains to the airports in a convenient way, valuable airport slots may be used for more profitable services rather than just as feeders for short flights."

Ollongren insists he is not worried about increased competition from trains. "At the end of the day, each mode of transport has its mission and its place in society," he says.

The need for improved coordination between air and rail services is expected to mushroom over the next few years as overcrowded airports grapple with a porjected 5% annual growth rate in international passenger traffic.

Diverting some of this traffic to rail also has environmental implications since, in addition to reducing the number of short-haul flights, it can help lower noise and air pollution from airport-bound cars.

No one doubts the need to relieve some of the pressure on airports. Passenger numbers at 29 European airports rose by 8.1% in the first half of 2000, while freight volumes increased by 7.4%, according to ACI. Altogether, the airports handled 246.7 million passengers and 7.4 million tonnes of freight.

Romano Pagliari, an airport development expert at Cranfield University College of Aeronautics in the UK, says this growth in traffic has forced airports to become more competitive and focus on customer service. "Twenty years ago airports were less business-minded than they are today," he says, arguing that by investing in public transport, airports can expand the area from which they can be reached within two hours, otherwise known as the 'catchment'.

Copenhagen Airport now attracts passengers from as far away as Malmö, Sweden, via the newly-completed Oresund bridge. The Scandinavian road-rail link - one of the EU's showcase transport projects - opened this summer. Now, when passengers arrive at the airport by train, they only have to take a 60-metre escalator ride from the platform to the check-in counter. An underground line connecting the airport to the city centre is also in the pipeline.

Other airports, such as Frankfurt and Paris' Charles de Gaulle (CDG), long ago anticipated the added value of connections between various forms of transport.

Frankfurt is linked to cities across Germany either by InterCity or high-speed Express trains which leave from a rail station just underneath the airport. Since the summer, passengers have also been able to check in their baggage and receive a boarding card at the train station. An estimated 300,000 passengers pass through the station every month. Eventually, the airport operator plans to shift some domestic flights to the rail network.

CDG has been linked to the French high-speed rail network since 1994, providing passengers with easy access to and from virtually anywhere in France. Momentum is building for other airports to do the same.

Earlier this year, Düsseldorf International opened a train station in conjunction with Deutsche Bahn, connecting the terminal to the long-distance and high-speed rail network.

In the UK, Manchester Airport plans to expand its rail network over the next few years, and British Airways is working with Railtrack and the British Airports Authority to develop a connection with London's Heathrow airport. Luxembourg, Linz and Bordeaux are either studying or planning new conventional or high-speed rail links within the next few years.

So far the emphasis has been primarily on rail, but some airports such as Eindhoven in the Netherlands and Birmingham in the UK are also planning better road access for buses and cars.

De Palacio supports these moves as an important step in the drive to improve air travel - something the Commissioner has emphasised as she oversees a major initiative to bolster passengers' rights. "This fits in well with what we want to develop," says her spokesman.

The EU has provided funding for many of these projects out of its budget for Trans-European Networks (TENs). In all, the European Commission has allocated €11.1 million in funding to airport projects from its 2000 TENs budget, of which €8 million has gone towards developing new links between different forms of transport.

But some in the industry argue that it has not done enough - and not all operators are capitalising on the opportunities.

Athens airport, for example, is long overdue for better road access - especially with the 2004 Olympic Games approaching, along with serious questions about whether the city's infrastructure will be able to cope with the event.

But perhaps the most glaring example is Madrid, where a new airport is being built a few kilometres away from a high-speed rail line. As yet, there are no plans to connect them.

"It would not be easy to remedy that," says Tim Goodyear, a spokesman for the International Air Transport Association. "There is an opportunity missed."