Perth has bucked the trend among several major airports across the country, being the only one to recover its passenger numbers to pre-pandemic levels.
Perth has bucked the trend among several major airports across the country, being the only one to recover its passenger numbers to pre-pandemic levels.
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s airport monitoring report 2023-24 collected data from Brisbane, Melbourne, Perth and Sydney airports.
In the report, the ACCC found an average growth of 13.7 per cent in passenger numbers with 114.6 million people reported across the four airports over the year.
Nationally, the passenger numbers were 4.7 per cent below pre-pandemic levels.
However, the ACCC reported that Perth was the only airport to have recovered to 2018-2019 levels.
“As noted above, the chart also shows that Perth Airport is exceeding its total pre-COVID-19 passenger numbers, and the other airports are closing the gap,” the report reads.
“Perth Airport was the only monitored airport to go against this trend, with its 11.8 million domestic passengers representing an increase of 16.1 per cent since 2018–19.
“Perth Airport’s increased domestic passenger numbers reflected a continued strong growth in the fly-in, fly-out resources sector in Western Australia.”
The ACCC also forecast Perth Airport as Qantas’ second biggest international gateway behind Sydney after the landmark agreement for a new terminal and runway for the national carrier in the west coast.
The 12-year agreement worth about $3 billion comprises new terminal facilities and a new, parallel runway at Perth Airport, with Qantas set to build a new engineering hangar in the area.
Qantas and Jetstar will relocate all services to a new terminal in the Airport Central precinct, as per the announcement made in May.
In the report, the ACCC reported a 12.8 per cent increase in Perth Airport’s car parking profit at $70.7 million.
“For motorists booking online for long-term parking at a distance from the terminal, Perth and Sydney airports are the most expensive and Melbourne Airport was the cheapest,” the report reads.
“All four monitored airports continued to report an increasing take-up of rideshare services in 2023–24.
“The greatest increase in rideshare usage was at Perth Airport, where its contribution to total landside access grew 8.9 percentage points to 64.3 per cent.”
