Graz Airport

Flughafen Graz
Summary
Airport typePublic
OwnerHolding Graz - Kommunale Dienstleistungen GmbH (93.9 %)
OperatorFlughafen Graz Betriebs GmbH
ServesGraz
LocationAbtissendorf, Feldkirchen and Thalerhof, Kalsdorf, Styria, Austria
Elevation AMSL340 m / 1,115 ft
Coordinates46°59′35″N 015°26′21″E / 46.99306°N 15.43917°E / 46.99306; 15.43917 (Graz Airport)
Websiteflughafen-graz.at
Map
GRZ is located in Austria
GRZ
GRZ
Location of airport in Austria
Runways
Direction Length Surface
m ft
16L/34R 640 2,100 Grass
16C 2,740 8,989 Asphalt
34C 3,000 9,842 Asphalt
16R/34L 760 2,493 Grass
Statistics (2023)
Passengers733,146
Aircraft movements9,655
Cargo (metric tons)19,379
Sources: Austrian AIP at EUROCONTROL[1]
Statistics,[2] Graz Airport Annual Reports 2021 and 2022.[3][4]

Graz Airport (IATA: GRZ, ICAO: LOWG), known as Flughafen Graz in German, is a primary international airport serving southern Austria. It is located near Graz, the second-largest city in Austria, in the municipalities of Feldkirchen and Kalsdorf, 5 NM (9.3 km; 5.8 mi) south[1] of Graz city centre.

Location

Graz Airport spans the village Abtissendorf in Feldkirchen municipality and the cadastral community of Thalerhof in Kalsdorf municipality. The airport terminal is located in Abtissendorf.

History

Early years

Construction of the airport began in 1913 with the construction of a grass runway and the first hangars; the airport saw its first flight in 1914. It was the site of Thalerhof internment camp, run by the governments of Franz Joseph I of Austria and Charles I of Austria. The first domestic passenger flight in Austria in 1925 serviced the route Vienna–Graz–Klagenfurt. In 1930 Yugoslav flag carrier Aeroput started regular flights linking Yugoslav capital Belgrade with Vienna with stops in Zagreb and Graz.[5][6] In 1937, construction of a terminal building began due to increase in the number of passengers.

After the end of the Second World War, Austria was forbidden to possess either a military or civilian aviation fleet. After the reopening of Austrian airspace in 1951, a new concrete runway of 1,500 metres (4,921 ft) was built in Graz. The runway was extended to 2,000 metres (6,562 ft) in 1962. The route network grew quickly and the first international scheduled flight started in 1966 with flights to Frankfurt.

In 1969, the runway was extended again, this time to 2,500 metres (8,202 ft), and construction of a new terminal building became necessary. Highlights were visits by Concorde in 1981 and by a Boeing 747 on the occasion of the airport's 70th anniversary in 1984. Ten years later, another new building was constructed with a maximum annual capacity of 750,000 passengers. The latest extension of the runway was to 3,000 metres (9,843 ft) in 1998.

Development in the 2000s

In early 21st century, the number of passengers exceeded the 750,000 mark and in 2004 was just below 900,000. This led to the final extension of the current terminal building in 2003 and the construction of a second terminal in 2005.

In summer 2015, the airport received two new routes to European hubs: Swiss International Air Lines to Zurich[7] and Turkish Airlines to Istanbul Atatürk Airport.[8] Though Turkish Airlines discontinued their services to Istanbul in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, Swiss International Air Lines announced it would increase the frequency of flights between Zürich and Graz in summer 2023.[9]

In December 2022, Eurowings announced that it will establish an additional base at Graz Airport, starting in 2023. This major commitment to Graz features nine new routes, with two of them linking Graz to Berlin and Hamburg and the other ones being leisure routes. Furthermore, the overall frequencies of already existing services to Düsseldorf and Palma de Mallorca will be enhanced.[10] Yet with all these new routes, the route from Graz to Stuttgart, which was established in 2021, was discontinued in April of 2023.[11]

In comparison to the summer of 2019, before the pandemic, Graz has just recovered a bit more than 50 percent of its passengers. This comes as both Austrian Airlines and Lufthansa have both drastically cut their services. While Austrian has ended every route from Graz apart from its feeder to Vienna, Lufthansa has downsized the frequency on its Munich route by 80%, from five daily flights to one.[11]

Facilities

The passenger terminal building features shops, travel agencies, a restaurant and cafés, conference facilities, a bank, car rental and service counters. The apron provides stands for aircraft up to the size of a Boeing 747 or An-124. There are no jet bridges, mobile stairways are used for boarding. The airport has a VIP lounge for business class customers and customers with priority status.

While there are no scheduled cargo flights to the airport, charter flights are regularly conducted, especially for time-critical cargo like automotive parts.

Airlines and destinations

The following airlines offer regular scheduled, seasonal, and charter flights at Graz Airport:[12]

AirlinesDestinations
Air Dolomiti Frankfurt
Austrian Airlines Vienna
Avanti Air Seasonal charter: Calvi,[13] Kefalonia,[14] Paros,[15] Skiathos[15]
Corendon Airlines Seasonal: Antalya, Heraklion,[16] Hurghada
Croatia Airlines Seasonal charter: Brač[13]
European Air Charter Seasonal charter: Heraklion[14]
Eurowings Berlin,[17] Düsseldorf,[18] Hamburg[17]
Seasonal: Chania,[17] Corfu,[17] Gran Canaria,[19] Hurghada,[20] Karpathos,[20] Kos,[17] Larnaca,[17] Palma de Mallorca,[13] Rhodes,[20] Tenerife–South[19]
FlyEgypt Seasonal charter: Hurghada[13]
KLM Amsterdam
Lufthansa Frankfurt, Munich
SunExpress Seasonal: Antalya (resumes 2 April 2024)[21]
Swiss International Air Lines Zürich

Statistics

Check-in area
Rooftop viewing area
Control tower
Annual passenger traffic at GRZ airport. See Wikidata query.

Access

Public transport

A bus stop can be found next to the arrival area.[22] Regional bus line 630 operates service to Graz, the transfer to central Graz takes approximately 25-35 minutes. The airport is within walking distance (approximately 420 metres, seven minutes on foot) of the Graz-Feldkirchen Airport Railway Station (Flughafen Graz-Feldkirchen Bahnhof). Line S5 (Graz to Spielfeld-Straß) connects the airport to Graz. The journey from the Graz-Feldkirchen Airport Railway Station to the Graz Central Station takes eleven minutes.

Car

Graz Airport is accessible via motorways A9 (exit Kalsdorf) and A2 (exit Flughafen Graz/Feldkirchen).

See also

References

  1. 1 2 EAD Basic
  2. ↑ "Kommerzielle Zivilluftfahrt 2021: Passagieraufkommen um 20,3% gestiegen, aber noch immer deutlich unter Vorkrisenniveau" [Commercial civil aviation 2021: Passenger traffic up 20.3%, but still well below pre-crisis levels.] (PDF; 66 KB). statistik.at (in German). Bundesanstalt Statistik Österreich. 24 February 2022. Retrieved 1 February 2023.
  3. ↑ "Annual report 2021" (PDF). Graz Airport. Feldkirchen bei Graz: Flughafen Graz Betriebs GmbH. Retrieved 2 February 2023.
  4. ↑ "Annual Report 2022" (PDF). Flughafen Graz (in German). Flughafen Graz Betriebs GmbH. May 2023. Retrieved 12 June 2023.
  5. ↑ Drustvo za Vazdusni Saobracaj A D – Aeroput at europeanairlines.no
  6. ↑ "World Airlines Directory". Flight International. 10 August 1944. p. 150.
  7. ↑ Airline route Archived 11 October 2014 at the Wayback Machine
  8. ↑ "Turkish Airlines Launches a New Route to Graz". Turkish Airlines (Press release). Retrieved 18 March 2015.
  9. ↑ "Summer 2023: SWISS increases Zürich-Graz" (in German). 21 November 2022.
  10. ↑ Gruber, Jan (6 December 2022). "Eurowings establishes base at Graz Airport (Eurowings errichtet Basis am Flughafen Graz)". aviation.direct. Retrieved 6 December 2022.
  11. 1 2 "Eurowings opens Graz base, becoming the airport's largest carrier in S23". 8 May 2023.
  12. ↑ "Summer schedule 2022". Flughafen Graz. Retrieved 4 August 2022.
  13. 1 2 3 4 https://www.flughafen-graz.at/fileadmin/user_upload/flugplan_Vorschau/Vorschau_Sommerflugplan2022.pdf
  14. 1 2 "Graz Airport - Summer schedule 2023" (PDF).
  15. 1 2 "Summer 2022: Springer Reisen flies with Austrian Airlines and Avanti Air". Aviation.direct. 15 February 2022.
  16. ↑ "Graz: Eight scheduled destinations and new holiday destinations in summer 2022". February 2022.
  17. 1 2 3 4 5 6 "Neue Direktflüge: Eurowings verbindet Graz mit Hamburg und Berlin". Kleine Zeitung (in German). 6 December 2022.
  18. ↑ aviation.direct (German) 28 September 2021
  19. 1 2 "Eurowings NW23 Spain Network Additions". AeroRoutes.
  20. 1 2 3 "New Routes and Destinations". 6 December 2022.
  21. ↑ "Sommer 2024: Sunexpress kehrt nach Graz zurück". 11 August 2023.
  22. ↑ "Public transport". Flughafen Graz. Retrieved 24 September 2015.

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