STOCKHOLM ARLANDA AND BUDAPEST CELEBRATE NEW ROUTE LAUNCHES

The last few days have been big ones for route launches in Europe with a number of airports announcing new services.

Stockholm Arlanda today announced that SAS launched new non-stop services to Miami, Eilat and Madeira from Sweden's capital gateway at the weekend.

The new Miami service means that the airport now offers eleven different direct routes to seven US destinations from Stockholm Arlanda.

“We are really pleased that SAS continues to expand its offering at Stockholm Arlanda with another intercontinental direct route," says Swedavia's director of aviation business, Elizabeth Axtelius.

"Traffic to and from the US has seen fantastic growth, and there has been an average annual increase of 10%  in the number of Swedes flying to Florida over the past five years. 

"With SAS’s new direct service, passengers can now fly quickly and conveniently to Miami, and more Americans can fly non-stop to Stockholm."

Elsewhere, Budapest Airport has announced that Ryanair will add six new services during the 2017/18 Winter Schedules.

Celebrating the notable addition of the Hungarian gateway’s first year-round service to Marrakech, the airline has also expanded its route network from Budapest by commencing twice-weekly services to Palermo, Valencia and Edinburgh and a five times weekly service to Prague, while a three times weekly service to Naples joins the roll call of destinations tomorrow.

Commenting on the the carrier's growth at the airport, Budapest’s head of airline development, Balázs Bogáts, says: “Adding these new services means Ryanair now offers 30 destinations from Budapest helping us work towards our strategic goal to ensure we offer a rich variety of destinations to our customers.”

Delivering more than 1.7 million passengers to Hungary’s capital city last year, Europe’s largest airline (in terms of passenger numbers) has expanded its route network from Budapest by 29% in 2017.

Launching the airport’s first direct link to Morocco, Ryanair’s service to Marrakech provides an in-demand link to a potential market of 30,000 round-trip passengers. 

Adding the airport’s 45thcountry market, the carrier’s route joins existing African links to Egypt, Algeria and Tunisia, meaning Budapest will offer close to 2,500 weekly seats to the region this winter.