Global air travel industry gravitates around Dubai

dubai - Dubai's aviation engine hasn't just been powered by Emirates but also flydubai

As yet another edition of the Arabian Travel Market (ATM) dawns here in Dubai, the importance of the city, the hub, the airports, airlines, demand and customers becomes ever-more enmeshed and vital to the success of the UAE's most glamorous city.

With the Dubai International Airport dominating international passenger traffic with another record-breaking year in 2016, the airport has become not just the backbone and life blood for the city, but it also highlights the significance that travellers, leisure and business alike, place on it as their preferred gateway - not just to and through the GCC, but to the whole world.

Dubai's aviation engine hasn't just been powered by the leviathan that is Emirates. Ever since it took its first flight to Beirut back in 2009, flydubai has equally be an integral part of the framework.

The airline has opened up over 50 city pairs that previously did not exist. Indeed, flydubai's passion for relentless expansion to deliver cost-effective air travel in markets where services did not exist underlines its drive to develop immature markets into mature, money-spinning ones that benefit Dubai's economy and beyond.

In recent years, however, we have seen wider global challenges that threaten the trajectory of aviation within Dubai and the wider UAE.
The new electronics ban is chief among them. In my view, an ill-thought out policy which does nothing to combat terrorism from other airports - it has certainly hit demand for travel at the likes of Emirates. However, the airline has bigger markets that it can fall back on to deliver not just rising passenger numbers, but also higher revenues.

Another aspect is the opening up of military air space to accommodate more civilian traffic as well as allow better usage of the skies to deal with logjams in the skies and delays on the tarmac. The renewed pace of development at Al Maktoum International, whose crucial second phase of expansion is already underway, highlights the need as well as challenge of balancing domestic security as well as that of expanding commercial traffic.

Having just been voted as one of the world's most safest countries, the UAE is keen to develop and exploit its credentials to further facilitate passengers connecting through its busy hubs in Dubai and Abu Dhabi.

As it stands, Dubai's eminent position as the leading gateway for one-stop connectivity anywhere in the world builds on the commercial success of Emirates - an airline that is instrumental in developing game-changing airplanes like 777X that help mould and influence travellers' choices.

Coupled with the resilience of Dubai's robust financial, commerce, transport, entertainment and retail businesses, the partnership between the airline and the emirate demonstrate the security which has allowed both parties to flourish. Long gone is the angst of 2008.

Dubai today is different. It works harder and it works smarter.

Just as the Arabian Travel Market emphasises the importance of the players, the Dubai Air Show, due this winter, emphasises how the global air travel market gravitates around this great city.

The writer is chief analyst at London-based StrategicAero Research. Views expressed are his own and do not reflect the newspaper's policy.