{"id":122214,"date":"2017-03-24T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2017-03-23T22:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/rhn.ro\/romanian-airports-require-significant-investment-in-the-coming-years\/"},"modified":"2026-03-28T13:57:38","modified_gmt":"2026-03-28T11:57:38","slug":"romanian-airports-require-significant-investment-in-the-coming-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rhn.ro\/en\/romanian-airports-require-significant-investment-in-the-coming-years\/","title":{"rendered":"Romanian Airports Require Significant Investment in the Coming Years"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>In 2016, the number of passengers transiting Romanian airports increased by 23.5% to 16.39 million passengers, of which over two-thirds passed through Henri Coanda Airport, according to data recently published by the National Institute of Statistics (INS). The expansion of low-cost air transport was the main cause of the increase in passenger traffic.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The top two players in the Romanian aviation market, Wizz Air and Blue Air, transported over 9 million passengers last year. For this year, Blue Air estimates a 13% increase in the number of passengers transported, up to 4.05 million.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Nationally, for this year, passenger traffic could increase by 15% at Henri Coanda Airport and by over 12% nationwide, according to informed sources. Thus, it is possible that by the end of this year, a traffic of 19 million passengers will be recorded nationally.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Cluj Airport, the second largest in the country, estimates 3 million passengers this year, an increase of about 60% compared to 2016, when it had 1.88 million passengers.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>In January of this year, the Cluj County Council announced that permits were issued for the construction of an aircraft parking platform and for the modernization of the departures terminal at the &#8220;Avram Iancu&#8221; International Airport in Cluj.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>In the context of the accelerated growth of passenger traffic, Romanian airports need investments and specialists, alongside less political interference in this sector, stated the president of the Association of Pilots and Aircraft Owners of Romania (AOPAR), Radu Merica.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>He believes that new terminals must be built at most airports, given that Henri Coanda Airport is the only airport where modern passenger processing stations exist.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>He warned that short-term solutions are often applied because there is no long-term vision, but these solutions end up being more costly in the long run. Thus, problems have already begun to appear even at the country&#8217;s largest airport, Henri Coanda, during peak hours.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>For this year, the heads of the Bucharest National Airports Company (CNAB) must implement certain measures to reduce waiting times at checkpoints at Henri Coanda, according to specialists.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Other needs at the national level are related to increasing regional mobility by developing airport infrastructure, increasing airport capacity in correlation with traffic demand and environmental protection objectives.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Thus, even if they are well distributed territorially, Romania&#8217;s regional airports in Timisoara, Cluj, Targu Mures, Baia Mare, Iasi, Suceava, or Bacau do not have the necessary infrastructure and facilities to serve large aircraft and the increased passenger traffic expected for the next 10 years, warned representatives of the Cluj airport, the largest outside the capital.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Representatives of the Cluj-Napoca airport stated that, in general, problems at Romanian airports are caused by the age of the infrastructure and the insufficiency of infrastructure objectives in relation to existing traffic.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<h3>Frequently Asked Questions<\/h3>\n<p><strong>What drove the growth in Romanian airport traffic?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The expansion of low-cost air transport was the primary factor, leading to a 23.5% increase in passenger numbers in 2016.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Which airport is the busiest in Romania?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Henri Coanda Airport (Otopeni) in Bucharest is the busiest, handling over two-thirds of the country&#8217;s total air traffic.<\/p>\n<p><strong>What are the main challenges for regional airports?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The main challenges include aging infrastructure and a lack of facilities necessary to accommodate large aircraft and the projected traffic growth for the next decade.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In 2016, the number of passengers transiting Romanian airports increased by 23.5% to 16.39 million passengers, of which over two-thirds passed through Henri Coanda Airport, according to data recently published by the National Institute of Statistics (INS). The expansion of low-cost air transport was the main cause of the increase in passenger traffic. The top&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":66599,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2853],"tags":[],"thb-sponsors":[],"class_list":["post-122214","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-investment"],"article_style_override":"","post-style":"","post_via":"","post-top-image":"https:\/\/rhn.ro\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/investitii-3.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rhn.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122214","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rhn.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rhn.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rhn.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=122214"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rhn.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122214\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rhn.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/66599"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rhn.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=122214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rhn.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=122214"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rhn.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=122214"},{"taxonomy":"thb-sponsors","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rhn.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/thb-sponsors?post=122214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}