Ryanair is expanding its operations and network in Italy following the announcement this week of 17 new summer routes and a new hub at Trieste Airport, in the country’s north eastern corner.
For its summer 2024 season the low-cost carrier will add seven new routes from Rome Fiumicino (to Dubrovnik, Gdansk, Gothenburg, Lisbon, Malta, Paris and Riga), connecting to a total of 82 destinations.
As a result, the carrier expects to increase traffic at its Fiumicino hub by 15 per cent to 11 million passengers per year.
An additional 10 new routes will be added to its operations from Milan, with five routes from Malpensa airport (to Athens, Budapest, Paris, Marrakech and Tallinn) and five from Bergamo airport (to Beni Mellal, Castellón, Dubrovnik, Sarajevo and Skiathos).
In total, the carrier will operate 150 routes from Milan with 31 Boing 737 aircraft, with Ryanair traffic set to increase 14 per cent year-on-year to 20 million passengers.
The carrier also announced plans to open a new “game changer” base at Trieste Airport from April 2024 where, following a $100 million investment in a new Boeing 737-8200 aircraft, it will operate five new routes to Berlin, Brindisi, Krakow, Paris and Seville.
The investment at Trieste Airport is expected to increase the carrier’s traffic at the airport by 50 per cent to 750,000 annual passengers and provide “unprecedented” connectivity to Italy’s Friuli Venezia Giulia (FVG) region via a total of 16 routes.
The move follows the decision by the FVG regional government to eliminate the highly-criticised municipal surcharge (equal to €6.5 for each departing passenger), which is currently imposed by Italian airports in other regions.
Trieste airport CEO Marco Consalvo, said: “The new Ryanair base will have a beneficial effect on the region’s economy in terms of employment growth, promoting accessibility to the region and increasing tourism from markets of particular interest to the FVG region.”
Following these investments in infrastructure and an expanded summer schedule, Ryanair further cements its dominant market position in Italy, with 18 bases across the country.
