Battle for the Bay

Competition is hotting up between airports serving the Greater Bay Area of Southern China. There are six airports, all within 150km of each other, competing for traffic to and from the cluster of 11 cities. With a combined population of 68 million and home to some of the most affluent people in China, indeed in the world, the game is on.

Hong Kong International Airport may be the best-known of the airports but Guangzhou Baiyun Airport is inching closer to the point where it is the bigger airport, at least in terms of airline capacity. Squeezed between these two major players is the challenger, Shenzhen Bao-an International Airport, which is making rapid strides to become a world class airport in its own right.

Economic growth is strong across the region and the resident population has an ever-increasing appetite to fly. All this means that each of these three airports are working to add capacity and develop new air services as fast as the market is growing. Smaller airports at Macau, Zhuhai and Huizhou may have their own niche in that market but with at least two more airports on the drawing board for the region, no airport can be complacent.

OAG’s latest Insight Report, Battle for the Bay, takes a closer look at the region, profiling and comparing each airport. It also considers the impact on airport catchment areas posed by new road and rail infrastructure projects which are shrinking the time to travel between various parts of the region and creating viable alternatives for travel into China.

Click here to download the report