Low cost carrier Transavia will commence operations between Amsterdam and Skopje next March. It will mark the first time Schiphol Airport and the Macedonian capital have been linked with a scheduled air service since September 2008. The Air France – KLM subsidiary will commence operations to Skopje on March 2, 2025, and maintain services twice per week. Ticket sales are due to commence later today. In January, both Transavia and Transavia Holidays will offer competitive promotional rates for the new route. The budget carrier faces no direct competition between the two cites, although Wizz Air serves Eindhoven, located some 125 kilometres south of Amsterdam, four times per week.
Transavia has had a long-running presence on the Macedonian market, operating charters to Ohrid since the 1970s. It has also flown to Skopje on a charter basis on several occasions. Skopje was last linked to Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport on a scheduled basis by MAT Macedonian Airlines in September 2008 with a weekly service, prior to the company’s collapse later that year. At the time, services were maintained with an 81-seat CRJ900 aircraft. Previously it flew to the city with its Boeing 737-300 jet. Based on indirect traffic flow, Amsterdam and Brussels are the busiest unserved European destinations out of Skopje, and the second and third busiest overall. Austrian Airlines and Lufthansa currently transfer the bulk of passengers between the two cities, followed by Croatia Airlines and Air Serbia.
Both the Dutch and French units of Transavia plan to increase their operations to the former Yugoslavia next summer by a combined total of 12%, while seat capacity will grow close to 17%. Apart from its new Skopje route, the airline has so far announced a new service between Paris Orly and Belgrade starting next April. It will also grow frequencies to Montenegro with services from Paris Orly to Podgorica doubling from two to four per week during the peak summer travel period, while operations from the French airport to Tivat will increase from thee to four weekly. Furthermore, the airline will boost its Orly – Split service from six weekly to daily.
