The Dynamics of Small and Peripheral Airports in Tourism and Regional Development: The Case of Greece

Abstract

Air transportation is a component of the national economies and plays an important role in the conduct of communication (especially amongst peripheral places), in the promotion of tourism, and generally in the economic and regional development. Within this context, this paper studies the regional dimension of the air transport in Greece, emphasizing to the factors that determine the attractiveness of the Greek regional airports by excluding the metropolitan cases of the Athens’ and Thessaloniki’s airports. The analysis is applied on air traffic statistics and on available spatial and financial information. For the study and the evaluation of the airport dynamics, a complex multiplier index is proposed, the results of which comply with the observations of the common practice and they can be used in other areas of application. The overall approach illustrates the contribution of the small and regional airports to tourism and regional development in Greece. © 2019, Springer Nature Switzerland AG.