Airport International Group (AIG), the Jordanian company responsible for the expansion, rehabilitation and operation of Queen Alia International Airport (QAIA), recently announced the airport’s passenger and aircraft movement traffic results for the first quarter of 2010, with the final tally showing a remarkable improvement in the airport’s overall performance over 2009.
Passenger traffic during the period reached 1,097,400 passengers, which translates to an impressive 20.9% increase over 2009. March recorded the highest traffic volumes with 392,400 passengers for the month. Aircraft movements for the quarter were strong; totaling 13,989 aircraft — a 13.9% increase over the previous year.
Commenting on these encouraging results, AIG’s Chief Executive Officer Curtis Grad said: “QAIA is continuing its trend of impressive year-on-year growth and is steadily emerging as the airport of choice in the Levant region. Last year was particularly challenging for the industry, but these results demonstrate the resilience of the Jordanian market and the effectiveness of the strategies implemented by AIG and its partners to create a robust and sustainable regional hub.”
Driven by Jordan’s commitment to “open skies” and market liberalization, QAIA’s route network has expanded dramatically over the past two years, offering travelers a greater variety of destinations and routing options, greater weekly frequencies and more competitive fares. Despite the global economic crisis, QAIA welcomed a host of new services and/or additional flight frequencies announcements over the past two years, from a broad range of air carriers including Royal Jordanian, Delta, Austrian, Malev, Fly Dubai, Wataniya, Air Arabia, Etihad, Turkish Airlines and Emirates; in addition to charter flights by Hamburg International, Air Mediterranee, Blue Panorama and Neosair.
A variety of new routes and additional flights frequencies have recently been announced to-and-from QAIA, effective this summer, including Iberia, airBaltic, Alitalia, Tarom Romanian and Vueling airlines, in addition to new charter flights from both MINT Airways and Adria Airways.
The rehabilitation and expansion works at QAIA are well underway with the new passenger terminal extending over 85,000 square meters. AIG, under the terms of a 25 year concession agreement with the Jordanian government, is responsible for the operation of the airport, the rehabilitation of existing facilities and the construction of the new terminal. AIG is a Jordanian company with private shareholding by Invest AD (Abu Dhabi, UAE), Noor Financial Investment Company (Kuwait), Edgo Group (Jordan), Joannou & Paraskevaides (Overseas) Limited (Cyprus), J&P-Avax (Greece) and Aéroports de Paris Management (France).
