Bern-Belp Airport

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Regional airport Bern-Belp
"Airport Bern-Belp"
Bern Airport Overview.jpg
Characteristics
ICAO code LSZB / LSMB
IATA code BRN
Coordinates

46 ° 54 '51 "  N , 7 ° 29' 50"  E Coordinates: 46 ° 54 '51 "  N , 7 ° 29' 50"  E
Height above MSL 510 m (1673  ft )
Transport links
Distance from the city center 6 km southeast of Bern
train S-Bahn lines S3, S31, S4, S44 to Belp
Local transport Bus route 160 from Bernmobil
Basic data
opening 1929
operator Airport Bern AG
surface 55 ha
Terminals 1
Passengers 151,621 (2018)
Flight
movements 		44,706 (2018)
Employees 56 FTE (Aug 2019)
Runways
14/32 1730 m × 30 m asphalt
14R / 32L 650 m × 30 m grass

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Locations of the 11 Swiss regional airports

The regional airport Bern-Belp (marketing name "Airport Bern") is the airport of the Swiss federal city of Bern . It is operated by the private company “Flughafen Bern AG”. The regional airport was the basis of the former SkyWork Airlines , whose grounding at the airport resulted in a loss of revenue of more than a third. The charter company Helvetic Airways is currently offering some flights during the holiday season, the federal air transport service has two business jets stationed, the Swiss Air Rescue operates a base and two helicopter companies as well as two flight schools (one for powered flight, one for glider flight) operate on the airfield.

Geographical location and transport links

The airfield is located six kilometers southeast of Bern in the area of ​​the municipality of Belp . Its location in the Belpmoos, an alluvial plain in the Aare valley , has given the airfield its locally familiar name.

Road traffic is accessed from the south via Vehweid from Hauptstrasse 6 and from the A6 Rubigen motorway exit, or from the north on Flugplatzstrasse via Kehrsatz. Paid outdoor parking is available. The airport is also easily accessible by public transport: Bernmobil's 160 line runs every half hour to Belp station, from where the S3, S4, S31 and S44 S-Bahn lines run to Bern's main train station. The travel time between the airport and Bern train station is 30 minutes. The line also connects the Bern-Belp airport with the surrounding communities of Konolfingen , Tägertschi , Münsingen , Rubigen and Belp.

A direct bus connection between Bern main train station and the airport was introduced in spring 2009 (three to four connections on weekdays, six on weekends), but abandoned in 2012 in favor of the current solution.

history

Alpar , which was initiated as a cooperative in 1929 and whose name referred to the Alps and the Aare , was not only the operator of the airfield, but also the first airline based in Bern. The Alpar had started flight operations with a Fokker F XI on June 8, 1929 , one month before the official airfield opening ceremony at the Bern-Belp airfield. The Alpar flew the Bern – Biel – Basel route up to three times a week with connections to the flights to Paris and London. With the beginning of the Second World War, operations were stopped. The flight operations, a flight school and the sightseeing flights were not enough to make ends meet without contributions from the canton and city of Bern; their grants remained “consistently high”. In 1950, the cooperative was converted into Alpar Flug- und Flugplatzgesellschaft AG , which has been operating under the name Flughafen Bern AG since May 2014, precisely because of the unfamiliarity of its then over 60-year-old name .

In order to generate more sales, the airport company announced at the end of 2019 that it wanted to use a crowdfunding campaign to found its own virtual airline called FlyBair, which should initially have been operated by German Airways . Helvetic Airways entered the gap in February 2020 . During November 2019, the campaign raised more than 1.1 million Swiss francs, around 2.5 million are needed to start flight operations. FlyBair is also planning flights from Sion Airport , but the start of flights had to be postponed from May 2020 to at least summer 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic .

Furnishing

The airfield has a paved runway 14/32 of 1,730 m length and a (currently inoperable) grass runway as well as a glider tow take-off runway and a glider landing field that also serves as a helisquare. The hard-surfaced runway was expanded by 220 m in 2008 in order to comply with the new safety regulations in European air traffic. A newly installed instrument landing system on runway 14 officially went into operation in September 2008, and a GPS approach procedure is also planned. However, this meets with strong resistance from the residents in the south, they are afraid of increased aircraft noise. The general aviation industry defends itself against the project because the control zone of the airport will be extended until after Thun.

use

Airlines and Destinations

Bern-Belp was the home base of SkyWork Airlines , which offered most of the destinations from here. In addition to seasonal hot water destinations around the Mediterranean, it also flew to several European cities. Destinations in Germany were Berlin-Tegel, Hamburg, Munich and Usedom. Graz was added to the route network from Berlin for the 2018 summer flight schedule. For the airfield, SkyWork accounted for 60 percent of the flights and a third of the revenue.

Germania and Helvetic fly to Bern all year round or seasonally. There are also glider and helicopter operations at the airfield , including a base for the Swiss Air Rescue Service and the headquarters of the former Heliswiss , as well as maintenance facilities. There is also a flying school with sightseeing flights, alpaviation AG, and a gliding school on the airfield.

Federal Air Transport Service

Swiss Air Force Falcon 50 in front of the Air Force hangar in Bern-Belp

The aircraft of the Air Transport Service of the Confederation of the Swiss Air Force and the FOCA are stationed at the regional airport in Bern-Belp .

statistics

Aerial view of Bern-Belp Airport
Apron and tower of the airport
year Flight movements Change in flight movements Passengers Increase in passengers
2018 44,706 −6.2% 151,621 −17.1%
2017 47,659 −5.1% 182,917 −0.2%
2016 50,199 −1.9% 183,320 −3.5%
2015 51,144 −5.9% 190,032 −1.5%
2014 54,300 −0.5% 192,846 −26%
2013 54,666 −10.5% 260'555 −4.1%
2012 59,669 −3.9% 271,111 +46.6%
2011 62,101 + 10.7% 184,831 +82.5%
2010 56,093 −0.2% 101,285 −5.9%
2009 56'201 + 14.9% 107,626 + 0.3%
2008 48,901 −4.5% 107,287 + 0.6%
2007 51,217 −0.1% 106,614 + 8.3%
2006 51,279 −1.3% 98,398 + 3.1%
2005 51,963 95,420

Trivia

The double hangar
  • The airfield, known as Bäupmoos in Bern German , gave its name to one of the most famous songs by the band Patent Ochsner .
  • The Biderhangar , a hangar of the aviation pioneer Oskar Bider , is classified as a cultural monument of national importance.

See also

literature

  • Rolf Ellwanger: Bern airport yesterday and today. The history of Bern-Belp Airport . Gümligen 1999, ISBN 3-905531-04-6 .
  • Sandro Fehr: The development of the third dimension. Origin and development of the civil aviation infrastructure in Switzerland, 1919–1990 . Chronos Verlag, Zurich 2014, ISBN 978-3-0340-1228-7 .

Web links

Commons : Bern-Belp Airport  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Bern Airport writes a loss of almost one million in 2018. In: htr.ch. June 13, 2019, accessed June 15, 2019 .
  2. ↑ Yves Schott: Airport CEO Urs Ryf wants to announce something big as early as October. In: baernerbaer.ch . August 13, 2019, accessed August 16, 2019 .
  3. ↑ AIP Switzerland . S. LSZB AD 2 - 5 ( online [accessed on November 12, 2015] last corrections: AIRAC AIP correction 010/2015 (effective date: November 12, 2015), AIP correction 012/2015 (effective date November 12, 2015)). online ( Memento from January 3, 2016 in the Internet Archive )
  4. ↑ Door-to-door timetable. In: bernmobil.ch. Retrieved December 23, 2019 .
  5. ↑ Line 160 feeder airport Bern. In: bernmobil.ch. Retrieved December 16, 2019 .
  6. ↑ Taking the bus directly to the airport ( Memento from September 14, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) accessed on February 16, 2014
  7. ↑ Benedikt Meyer: In flight. Swiss airlines and their passengers, 1919-2002. Chronos, Zurich 2014, ISBN 978-3-0340-1238-6
  8. ^ AG application to change the name at the GV 2014 ( Memento from September 24, 2015 in the Internet Archive )
  9. ↑ German Airways is leaving Flybair , aerotelegraph, February 11, 2020
  10. ↑ dk: FlyBair achieves crowdfunding target - ticket sales can begin. In: airliners.de. November 29, 2019, accessed November 30, 2019 .
  11. ↑ The FlyBair flight days have been set. In: travelnews.ch. December 8, 2019, accessed December 23, 2019 .
  12. ↑ LSZB - BERN-BELP . In: Skyguide (Ed.): AIP Switzerland . November 8, 2018.
  13. ↑ View: GPS triggers the aircraft noise dispute in Bern
  14. ^ Statement by the Swiss Aeroclub ( Memento from February 1, 2014 in the Internet Archive )
  15. ↑ Bern Airport is looking for a Skywork replacement , accessed on September 12, 2018