Originally Posted by
mariofly12
That's a lot of routes..Why is FR suddenly trimming down the WMI base? Where will the 2 planes go?
The situation in Warsaw is complicated. Basically there are three main shareholders, Polish State Airports - PPL (who also own Chopin Airport), the local authorities and the Military as well as one minor shareholder.
Polish State airports has been blocking expansion of the airport since the constitution of the airport means that all shareholders must agree unanimously to a resolution for it to be passed. PPL has been blocking any resolution at expanding the airport or the facilities, against the wishes of the board.
PPL has said it is willing to finance the expansion in the airport, if the other shareholders sell up to them. It is also willing to invest in the airport if they are given 51% of the airport and the unanimous condition is removed. Basically they want to use the unanimous rule to frustrate others when they don't have a majority shareholding, but they want to remove that rule if they do have the majority so nobody can frustrate them - a pretty thinly veiled tactic for all to see.
They then want to stop the airport being a low cost airport and instead turn it into a full service airport that is based on the same pricing that they are charging at the main airport in Warsaw and run it as a duopoly. Many believe this is in order to remove the advantages that Ryanair to have to protect LOT who are being undercut by Ryanair quite substantially. They are now playing the game that if the local authorities do not sell up, the airport might go bankrupt and taxpayers money will be wasted. To date, the local authorities won't sell up as they do not trust PPL at all.
With this in mind, PPL has turned to a Plan B. It has decided to invest in expanding the airport in Radom, recently liquidated, that no airlines fly to as it's unattractive to them and will spend hundreds of millions in upgrading it. After which point it is going to force all charters out of Chopin Airport into Radom and wants to do the same with low cost carriers. It's strategy seems to be that sooner or later Modlin will go bust whilst they frustrate it's expansion plans and block board resolutions. Ryanair will have to move to Radom which will be totally controlled by PPL and this is far less of a threat to LOT than an airport in the Warsaw area would be.
Many view this whole situation as one big protection of LOT and if Modlin going to the wall and spending lots of money upgrading an airport that nobody wants to fly to and forcing low cost carriers and charters there as they're pushed out of Chopin and Modlin is closed needs to happen in order to do that, that is what will have to be done.
PPL don't have full control over Modlin and they don't like it, essentially many believe that the whole situation is designed to either get control or try and ensure it no longer exists - as you can imagine the issue is subject of complaints to the European Union and also illustrates why I believe it is against the interests of consumers of one organisation to have interest in two competiting airports in the same city.