"They wanted lower taxes and as many services as possible from us, which was not possible. Of course, any withdrawal of an airline is a loss, but we are in talks with other companies to cover this gap," said Dan Balacel, manager of Arad airport.
In the wake of Ryanair's departure, only Blue Air operates flights from Arad, to Bucharest, Stuttgart, Verona, and Valencia. According to Ryanair officials, the company's decision to drop the flight from Arad, a "provincial city on the global map", is hurting the local economy.
"We've brought over 10,000 visitors here and we've created 100 jobs, which has contributed over four million euros to the local economy," said Michael Cawley, deputy chief manager with Ryanair.
Ryanair carried around 4,000 persons each month on its Arad-Bergamo route, with ticket prices that started from 12.99 euros. There are other low-cost carriers on the market that have similarly low tariffs to attract passengers. Ryanair representatives could not be contacted by ZF to make any further comments. Ryanair's decision to drop Arad as a destination comes in the midst of a crisis at an international level due to rising fuel prices. As a result, the airline recently announced that it intended to ground almost one third of its aircraft and cease operations from seven European airports because of excessive fuel prices. In 2008, Ryanair could register its first year of losses since 1997, when the company floated on the stock exchange.
The airline, which entered Romania in April with two routes (Arad-Milan and Constanta-Pisa), launched the same aggressive policy its customers have grown used to, which targeted 50% of the entire airline market over 5 years. Ryanair's target was to outrun the national airline company TAROM. However, after half a year on the market, Ryanair not only lags far behind the local company, but also sits at the bottom end of the low-cost carriers' ranking in Romania.
Without the route, the annual projection of 80,000-passengers will not be met and the company has yet to announce any new flights.
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