DEMAND GENERATION AND REDISTRIBUTION EFFECTS OF NEW DECENTRAL INTERCONTINENTAL AIR SERVICES IN GERMANY

摘要

Since only two years, network carriers have started to build up services between secondary airports in Germany and intercontinental destinations. Such services have been concentrated on hub airports in the past, and they are still predominantly offered between hub airports. However, growing demand in line with increasing airline competition and deregulation of important markets on the one hand and new aircraft suited for intercontinental services with lower than hub-to-hub demand on the other hand trigger new decentral services on intercontinental routes. In both deregulated and still regulated markets airlines state their interest more often to open up such services, in regulated markets, however, they are often hindered on grounds of existing bilateral agreements. German passenger statistics indicate that these services have a strong effect on generating new origin-destination demand, however, not such a strong effect on redistributing demand between hub and affected secondary airports. Nevertheless, hub-bypassing services reduce directly corresponding passenger volumes at hub airports, thus weakening the hub importance. It is the objective of the paper to analyse these effects by route markets and draw conclusions regarding the generation and redistribution of demand, and to look into the future of intercontinental networks with respect to the relative role of hub and secondary airports.