Economic crisis and tourism competitiveness in Spain: permanent effects or transitory shocks?

This paper considers the influence of business cycles and economic crises on Spain's tourism competitiveness. This competitiveness is measured by its share in world tourism. Analysing the presence of unit roots in the market share series from 1958 to 2010, the permanent effects of economic crises on competitiveness are evaluated. The evidence from standard linear unit root tests indicates that crises on Spanish market shares are highly persistent. When we account for endogenously determined structural breaks, we obtain greater support for stationarity, but breakpoints are identified with major economic crises. Therefore the main conclusion obtained is that the effects of the economic shocks are not neutral on competitiveness, with the negative effects being more persistent in highly intensive crises. These crises reinforce a natural downward trend of the Spanish world tourism market share caused by the natural emergence of new competing destinations and by the maturity of the Spain's principal tourism product.     

A comparative efficiency analysis of Spanish and Turkish airports

AENA in Spain and DHMI in Turkey operate a large majority of the airports in their respective countries. These two airport operators share some similar characteristics, but also present many differences with respect to their management strategies. For instance, the Turkish DHMI introduced a Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT) model and concession agreements, which enables active private participation in airport management. In contrast, management and operation responsibilities at all airports in Spain –with a few exceptions-have remained with AENA. This paper utilizes a data envelopment analysis (DEA) to compare the relative efficiency of airports within AENA and DHMI for the years between 2009 and 2011. Based on the efficiency scores, it further identifies the sources of inefficiencies resulting from various management strategies and other external factors. The results indicate higher average efficiency levels at Spanish airports, but private involvement enhances efficiency at Turkish airports. The majority of the airports in Spain and Turkey operate under increasing returns to scale. Certain policy options, including a higher private involvement and improvement of the airport network by closing some inefficient airports, should be considered in order to increase the airport efficiency in both countries.     

The British working class on holiday: a critical reading of ITV's Benidorm

Informed by the thesis that media representations are influential channels for the birth and reinforcement of discursive constructions, this article will focus on representation in ITV's successful sitcom Benidorm (2007–). The corpus analysed includes the show's first four seasons and 2009 special, which are all the Benidorm materials available on DVD at the time of writing. Given this TV production's subject matter, insights will be provided into Spain's sand-and-sun tourism industry, with particular reference to the resort of Benidorm. Benidorm will be placed within the wider British sitcom tradition and humour will be treated as intersecting with power and social structures and so inseparable from social and national discourses. The interface will be explored between televised humour and the discourses of tourism, with particular reference to current British identity issues such as how British classed identities perceive Other imagined communities, in particular, Spain and the Spanish; and how such identities are performed spatially whilst on holiday.     

Privatization,corporatization, ownership forms and their effects on the performance of the world's major airports

This paper focuses on measuring and comparing productive efficiency and profitability among airports owned and operated by government departments, 100% government-owned corporations, independent airport authorities, mixed enterprises with government majority ownership and mixed enterprises with private majority ownership. The analysis is based on a cross-sectional, time-series dataset (2001–2003) for the major Asia-Pacific, European and North American airports. There is strong evidence that airports with government majority ownership and those owned by multi-level of government are significantly less efficient than airports with a private majority ownership; there is no statistically significant evidence to suggest that airports owned and operated by US government branches, independent airport authorities in North America, or airports elsewhere operated by 100% government corporations have lower operating efficiency than airports with a private majority ownership; airports with a private majority ownership achieve significantly higher operating profit margins than other airports; whereas airports with government majority ownership or multi-level government ownership have the lowest operating profit margin; and generally, airports with a private majority ownership derive a much higher proportion of their total revenue from non-aviation services than any other category of airports while offering significantly lower aeronautical charges than airports in other ownership categories excluding US airports. The results suggest that private–public–partnership with minority private sector participation and multi-level governments’ ownership should be avoided, supporting the majority private sector ownership and operation of airports.     

Spanish airports performance and efficiency benchmark. A PESA-AGB study

This study uses a MCDA tool to analyse and improve Spanish airports performance and efficiency. Thus, a holistic study using MACBETH (with PESA-AGB) is used. This study has never been applied before in Spanish airports. Firstly, a literature review related to this study keywords is conducted, as well as about benchmarking concept applied specifically to airports. Secondly, several methodologies in used to benchmark airports are reviewed and compared. Thirdly, airport performance and efficiency issues are addressed and described. Finally, the MCDA-MACBETH (with PESA-AGB) tool is applied to 4 Spanish airports.Spanish airports belonging to AENA transported 263, 753, 406 passengers in 2018 with an increase compared to 2017 of 5.8%. General data enables to conclude that.Spanish air transportation system is growing annually and hence there is the need to improve airports performance and efficiency, also to maintain the high levels of quality to address the growing demand. Spanish air transportation system is growing annually and is it upmost important to maintain high levels of quality to address such demand. Through this study, performance and efficiency improvements are seek within several airport key areas such as Safety and Security, Quality Service, Productivity and Effectiveness, Financial and Environment.     

Pro-competition rules in airport privatization: International experience and the Brazilian case

This article aims to demonstrate the importance of establishing pro-competition rules in the concession of multiple airports to private companies by describing the recent Brazilian experience. More specifically, it addresses: (i) how the economic literature deals with potential competition among different airports, and how this competition was dealt with in the concession programs of Australia, Mexico and the United Kingdom; and (ii) Brazil's recent experience with airport concessions, where international benchmarking led to cross-ownership restrictions. As a conclusion, this paper defends that governments should design regulatory restrictions that account for the existence of competition among airports. Nevertheless, these restrictions must be carefully planned and designed to achieve their goals.     

Living “up in the air”: Meeting the frequent flyer passenger

This paper uses a large database of approximately 37,000 passengers and three different estimates to analyse the characteristics of the frequent flyer and the differences between frequent flyers and occasional flyers. The results show that frequent flyers are middle-aged men with a high level of education who take domestic flights for business reasons at both hub and regional airports, where they make a purchase and/or consume F&B. Frequent flyers fly on both low-cost and traditional airlines, are more likely to stay overnight at a relative's or friend's home and travel to the airport by private or rented car.     

Airport ground access and private car use: a segmentation analysis

The increasing scale of, and demand for, civil air transport world-wide has resulted in a greater volume of people travelling to and from airports. The vast majority of these journeys are made by private cars, which has led to traffic congestion and raised levels of air pollution in and around airports. Subsequently, airports are re-evaluating their approach to ground access mode choice and considering how to reduce the reliance on private cars. Based on a survey of passengers at Manchester Airport in the UK, attitude statements pertaining to psychological constructs from the Theory of Planned Behaviour and the Norm-Activation Theory, combined with key factors relating to the passenger’s trip, are used to identify eight behaviourally distinct groups of passengers with varying potential to reduce their private car use. Two of these groups, described as the Conflicted Greens and the Pessimistic Lift Seekers, are identified as having the greatest potential to reduce private car use to airports. Analysis reveals the need for decision makers to address the existing attitude–behaviour ‘gap’ that can prevent positive environmental attitudes being translated into the use of more sustainable modes, as well as tackling the perceived difficulty some passengers associate with using these modes.     

Tourist modernisation and social legitimation in Spain

Spain's modernisation has been based, to a large extent, on the so‐called ‘residential tourism’. Its two‐fold nature—as a production model and a type of lifestyle migration—has complex repercussions. The aim of this paper is to delve, with a qualitative approach, into the key factors that explain the current social legitimation of this process by the Spanish society. The research suggests that the process is legitimated by its definition as an essentially tourism phenomenon. The label ‘tourism’ acts as some sort of ‘funnel’ that would not allow to go through it the problems associated with lifestyle migration or urbanisation. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Airport privatization with public finances under stress: An analysis of government and investor's motivations

The management model of airports has long stood as a central research area in the transport sector. There are a wide range of studies that focus on the potential benefits and pitfalls of private airport management. The results of these efficiency studies have not provided irrefutable evidence for the superiority of private management over public management, but the momentum towards privatizing airports is growing. The reason for privatization has been more related with privatization revenues for governments, rather than more efficient management. The search for maximizing the sale value can have negative impacts from a welfare perspective, for example, through excessive increases in tariffs for passengers. This research reflects on the motivations for governments to privatize, and is illustrated by a case study – Portugal – in which the privatization occurred as a result of three main large drivers: 1) a bailout programme by the IMF, the EU, and the ECB; 2) a revision of the regulatory model, and; 3) the need to increase the capacity of Lisbon's airport system in the medium term.     

A decision framework for successful private participation in the airport sector

As private participation in public airports becomes a global trend, there are a number of concerns and debates over the conflicting interests of the private and public sectors. For instance, the private sector's interest in maximizing profits often opposes the public sector's interest in protecting the public interest and social welfare. In this paper, we reframe the conflict in terms of principal-agent theory, and inform policymakers to understand public-private management problems in a broader context. Firstly, we demonstrate how various ownership and governance structures shape the private participation based on (1) ownership-type, (2) mode of ownership shift, and (3) ex-post government control. Secondly, we then highlight that this process should be context-based, and examine the recent case of Incheon International Airport (IIA) in South Korea to illustrate the importance of contextual factors. Lastly, we provide comprehensive recommendations to policymakers involved in bringing private partners into the airport sector, which include setting a clear agenda, exercising a reasonable level of control, understanding the sharing of risk and responsibility under different structures, and assessing technical, economic and political factors that may affect the policy outcome.     

Connectivity levels and the competitive position of Spanish airports and Iberia’s network rationalization strategy, 2001-2007

This paper examines the connectivity of the Spanish airport system between 2001 and 2007. Over the period, network carriers considerably strengthened the connectivity between Spanish airports and major European hubs. Although OneWorld is still the dominant alliance in Spain, SkyTeam and Star achieved a larger connectivity share through the growth of indirect services provided through their northern European hubs. In addition, the network rationalization strategy of Iberia and its decision to concentrate operations at Madrid-Barajas had important implications for the connectivity of other Spanish airports. Low-cost carriers have boosted direct connectivity from secondary Spanish airports.     

Nested logit model formation to analyze airport parking behavior based on stated preference survey studies

The rapid growth of private car ownership and utilization has resulted in significant parking-related congestion problems at large-scale international airports. Parking facilities located in the peripheral areas of airports could be more efficiently used to mitigate congestion and reduce delays due to dramatically increasing traffic demands and inferiorly designed parking lot configurations. In order to analyze the travelers' parking choice preferences for the off-site airport parking activities, a stated preference survey study was conducted around Terminal 3 at Beijing Capital International Airport. Two nested logit models were formulated to analyze the correlation between travelers' parking behavior and their travel characteristics. The research results indicate that travelers prefer to choose off-site parking facilities for long-term parking. A free and fast operation of connections should be provided in consideration of the long-distance layouts of parking facilities. A classification analysis of travelers with different preferences was conducted and the potential changes in travelers' parking choices to off-site parking lots were quantified. The research findings are helpful for traffic management agencies to develop practical guidelines for the establishment of new parking facilities with multiple access points at airports.     

Airport partial and full privatization in a multi-airport region: Focus on pricing and capacity

This paper studies the capacity and pricing choice of two congestible airports in a multi-airport metropolitan region, under transition from a pure public, centralized airport system to partial or full privatization. We develop analytical models to investigate three privatization scenarios: public–private duopoly, private–private duopoly, and private monopoly. We find that, airports follow the same capacity investment rule as prior to privatization when capacity and pricing decisions are made simultaneously. Pricing rule after privatization becomes more complicated, with additional factors having an upward effect on the privatized airport(s) and a downward effect on the remaining public airport.     

Comparative analysis of efficiency for major Southeast Asia airports: A two-stage approach

Within the past few years, the economy of Southeast Asia has been expanding rapidly with the rise in demand for air transport services. International airports are important driving forces for Southeast Asia countries' economies. Therefore, the competitive ability of these airports is very essential in terms of development and competitiveness within the region. This paper investigates the capabilities of these airports by a two-stage approach. The strengths and weaknesses of each Southeast Asia airport are evaluated by Data Envelopment Analysis – Slack-Based Measurement (DEA-SBM) in the first stage. This is a non-parametric approach to measure the efficiency of 9 major airports in the area including Changi Airport (Singapore), Suvarnabhumi Airport (Thailand), Kuala Lumpur Airport (Malaysia), Soekarno Hatta Airport (Indonesia), Ninoy Aquino Airport (the Philippines), Noi Bai Airport, Tan Son Nhat Airport (Vietnam) and Guangzhou Baiyun Airport (China), Hong Kong Airport (Hong Kong). In the second stage, Tobit regression is used to estimate the influence of multiple factors toward the efficiency of each airport. By generalizing and comparing two stages, the analysis allows us to evaluate each airport's efficiency in seven years, as well as the impact of multiple factors in one airport's performance. The implications for improvement are also obtained and discussed.     

Marketing innovation: Sources,capabilities and consequences at airports in Europe's peripheral areas

This paper investigates sources, capabilities and consequences of marketing innovation at airports in Europe's peripheral areas. A questionnaire-based survey was administered to airport managers. Ten sources of airport marketing innovation are identified. Innovation is significantly higher at airports that are administered as an independent entity compared to airports that are administered as part of a regional or national airport system. Large airports have a significantly higher level of innovation compared to small airports. Innovation has a significant positive effect on airport marketing performance, irrespective of the strategic focus of the airport.     

Sustainable efficiency drivers in Eurasian airports: Fuzzy NDEA approach based on Shannon's entropy

This research explores the physical infrastructure and flight consolidation efficiency drivers of Eurasian airports regarding their infrastructure and movement productivity levels. A novel Fuzzy Double-Frontier Network DEA (FDFNDEA) model is proposed to investigate the relationship between desirable (freight and passenger turnovers) and undesirable (pollutant emission levels due to aircraft movements) outputs against the respective infrastructure usage, fuel consumed, and movements performed at each of the 23 Eurasian airports from 2000 to 2018. This balance between desirable and undesirable outputs emerges spatially and temporally due to the evolution of the airport system's productive resources at each one of the Eurasian countries over the period observed. Shannon's entropy is used as the cornerstone to quantify the input and output vagueness of this evolution in Triangular Fuzzy Numbers (TFN), thus allowing the accurate building of alternative optimistic and pessimistic double-frontier efficiency. Differently from previous research, Shannon's entropy is the key for measuring input and output vagueness levels in light of the maximal entropy principle. This principle states that the distribution that best represents the current state of knowledge is the one with largest entropy. Maximal entropy yields bias-free decision-making in the sense that the input/output distributional profiles for Eurasian airports contain the maximal possible heterogeneity, working as a robust or best/worst-case scenario against eventual unconsidered assumptions. Hence, optimistic and pessimistic Malmquist Productivity Indexes (MPI) for overall and each stage productivity results are subsequently regressed against contextual variables related to airport characteristics and regional socio-demographic and economic indicators of each Eurasian country using bootstrapped Cauchy regressions. The findings revealed the spatial heterogeneity of productivity factors and airport performance across Eurasia. Results also demonstrated the negative impact of income inequality and the positive impact of private participation on technological progression in the Eurasian airport industry.     

The determinants of aeronautical charges of U.S. airports: A spatial analysis

Using U.S. airport data from 2009 through 2016, this study examines the determinants of aeronautical charges of large and medium hub airports and accounts for the spatial dependence of neighboring airports in a spatial panel regression model. Our results show that U.S. airports' aeronautical charges are spatially dependent, and neighboring airport charges are positively correlated, implying that U.S. airports are in price competition with each other even though they are government-owned infrastructure. Additionally, we find evidence of airport cost recovery through non-aeronautical revenues. This may be indicative of the airport's cross-subsidizing aeronautical operations with non-aeronautical revenues. In addition, we found the airports that share revenues with airlines charge lower aeronautical fees than those that do not share revenues. We also found that more congested airports charge higher aeronautical fees.     

Managing New Zealand's airports in the face of commercial challenges

This paper explores commercial issues surrounding managing airports in New Zealand. Airport managers face pressures from changing airport–airline relationships, low cost airlines, proposed new airports and the growing importance of non-aeronautical revenues in achieving commercial goals. New Zealand's airports have moved from an operating environment within which all the principal airports were owned and managed by central government to one where airports are run as commercial entities under a variety of ownership structures. New Zealand has a high dependence on air transport and for its size, a very developed regional airport network.     

Effects of competition and policy changes on Chinese airport productivity: An empirical investigation

This paper investigates the influence of competition and aviation policy reform (for example, the airport localization program and listing airports on stock markets) in China on the efficiency of Chinese airports. By using Data Envelopment Analysis, we estimate both the productivity level and its growth for 25 sample Chinese airports. After controlling for hub status and other airports' characteristics, we find that: (i) publicly listed airports are significantly more efficient than non-listed airports; (ii) airports with more competition are more efficient than their counterparts; (iii) the airports' efficiency and the technical progress are positively correlated with the airport localization program; and (iv) the impacts of open-skies agreements and airline mergers on the airports' efficiency are statistically insignificant.