Aviation in our country started the millennium with many new challenges. Our flag carrier, Sabena went bankrupt and the aftermath of 9/11 had an unprecedented impact on aviation world-wide and in our country. A drastic wave of renewal among Belgian airline companies fundamentally changed the landscape. Ownership of many key players at the airport changed hands. The national airport itself was privatized. The post-Sabena era was characterised by a new dynamic, characterised especially by the growth of the “home” market and a reduced share of transfer traffic.  The low cost market expanded at a rapid rate.  New long-haul companies followed in the footsteps of those which had withdrawn in 2001/2002. The current crisis has put a temporary halt to this growth and the sector is once again consolidating. Undoubtedly it will emerge from the struggle with renewed strength soon when the economy revives.

While passenger transport is a lever for the business world as well as for tourism, Air freight forms an essential part of the logistics backbone of modern industry evolving towards faster processing times and specialised niche activities. A study by the Catholic University of Louvain a few years ago and a recent analysis by the National Bank of Belgium both endorse the role of Brussels Airport as an economic portal and engine for job creation in the region. Each job directly created at Brussels Airport produces two additional jobs in the wider environment. This conversion ratio applies to most airports. Brussels Airport is also the lifeline for institutions such as the EU, Nato and many hundreds of small and large companies which depend on their presence. These, in turn, provide a reason for the existence of a rich variety of companies in aviation, logistics, tourism and many other related sectors.

Against these undeniable economic advantages of having a large, successful airport serving the needs of the capital of Europe are justifiable demands of the everyday living environment. The quality of the air and noise levels experienced by nearby residents needs to be taken into consideration when planning for the future.

The advance of technology is an important means towards this end. Aircrafts that are quieter, use less fuel and emit fewer combustion fumes, new landing procedures, and the use of alternative energy at airports will all improve the impact of the sector on the living environment in the medium to long term. 

We also see an increasing demand for low fare travel, certainly for travel within Europe. This demand is being met by a rapid growth of low-cost companies, but also by an attractive pricing policy on the part of the traditional carriers.  Full-service companies like Brussels Airlines are offering low fares that can compete with those of the low cost carriers in their tariff structures. Most of the former charter companies also sell individual tickets and focus on low-cost and last minute offers nowadays. When booked early, most European destinations can be reached for a return fare of less than 100 euro, all costs included.  A flight to Southern Europe is becoming fully competitive with the journey by car.

Automation makes it possible for quite a number of processes to become quicker, more accurate and often cheaper. More and more tickets and other travel products are being sold via the internet. Checking in is also increasingly being done at home and at the office, via the internet. At the airport itself, moreover, there are check-in machines which save passengers time by checking themselves in. Even the boarding process is automated: various trial programmes are running at the moment whereby barcodes on the screen of the passenger’s GSM or PDA replace the boarding pass. 

Technology also provides significant support at the level of security and there are high expectations of developments around biometrics (personal recognition via iriscopy, fingerprints or other unique characteristics).

The events of September 2001 in the US led to the addition of security measures worldwide that had not been seen before. This was followed in 2006 by limitations on the carrying of liquids and gels in passenger cabins, with drastic monitoring procedures. These measures have had an impact on the time and comfort of travellers. The challenge for a modern airport is to reconcile thorough security checks with passengers’ needs in terms of comfort, time and privacy: principles which are sometimes at odds with each other.

Trains have an important influence on aviation for two reasons. High speed trains are competing with airlines for passengers on short point to point distances like Amsterdam, London or Paris. On the other hand this very same train offers better transport to passengers with slightly further destinations, between the airport and their homes or workplaces. This evolution widens the hinterland of the airport. As a result, the airport increasingly acquires a multimodal character.

As a junction of different forms of transport the airport is a fertile breeding ground for a range of business-related activities. Airports are experiencing increasing interest as locations for the building of hotels, meeting centres, office environments with added value and conference facilities.

More than ever, alongside such super-gateways like London and Frankfurt, mega-airports with a million passengers per week, there is a need for efficient secondary gateways with intercontinental specialisation. What Vienna is for Eastern Europe and the Middle East, and Helsinki for Asia, Brussels is for Central Africa and India today. The proximity of the European capital in Brussels also ensures a main role for us in intra-European transport.

The needs of a family with children and a baby are different from those of the departing business passenger. Airports need increasingly to recognize and address these different needs. That’s why we now increasingly see fast lane security services and quick check-in facilities for the business traveller and facilities like kids play areas for the leisure passengers. 

Moreover, there is another reality which airports cannot ignore. Low Cost today transports a third of all passengers travelling within Europe, and within four years will transport one-half. Passengers on these airlines chose them strictly on the basis of price and have no need for alls sorts of services that traditional airlines – and airports – offer. Meeting the needs of those passengers by the traditional airports, like Brussels, is also a major challenge

Attracting integrators such as FedEx, DHL and TNT for the expansion of sorting centres and the establishment of their hubs offered new opportunities to the cargo community and the business world in the 70’s. Nowadays there is limited public support for freight activities which predominantly need night flights. These night operations are increasingly being replaced by airfreight activities which can be carried out during the day, and are often closely related to passenger transport by the same company.

Airfreight is an important economic driver for our economy. New activities arise from the presence of the rapid transport opportunities provided by the airports. The market demands better security, intelligent logistics processes and the presence of companies at the airport itself that can produce added value in the logistics process (repackaging, sorting, order-picking, ...). At the same time the strength of a medium-sized airport is shown by its capacity to handle specific niche products: valuable goods, perishable cargo, live transport, dangerous products.

Competition between airports was virtually non-existent in the past, but today it is raging full-on.  Brussels competes with Amsterdam and Paris for passengers to Africa, India or North America. It competes for leisure passengers with other regional airports in Belgium but also the Netherlands, Germany and France. It competes with both large international hubs but also specialized smaller airports for freight.  Successfully meeting those competitive challenges and doing this in a way that has broad public support—that is the key challenge for aviation in Belgium for the future.