Overview of Air Transport in Australia

Air transport makes a significant contribution to the economy of Australia since it’s a major employment provider and provides market to local suppliers, besides the sector helps in the transportation of both local and foreign passengers within and outside the country (Holland & Cooksley, 2008).

Foreign tourists arriving by air in Australia spend their money in the country thus improving the local economy, this in turn supports local jobs (Adler, Fu, Oum & Yu, 2014). In 2014 the air transport supported $34.2 billion gross value added contribution to Australian GDP (Cheng, 2009).  

There are various types of transport in Australia which are highly used and dependable and one of them is air transport. There are at least 300 airports in Australia which have cemented airstrips. In current years there have been much discussions over the capability of planned air services to and from various regional communities in Australia (Sturman, Tyson & D’abreton, 2007). There have been issues over the past few years with strategy makers over sustainability and accessibility of regional airports in Australia. There are various types of airports in Australia namely, domestic regional and state airports (Australia, 2012).

The airports in the sector are categorized into three major sector, the international airports, the regional airports and the domestic airports (Leigh, 2009). This project will analyze data obtained from various sources which comprises airport passenger movement per month, airport aircraft movement per month, airport aircraft movement for years and the airport passenger movement for years this will help discover trends and patterns in the various airports in Australia with the aim of helping various stakeholders in planning (Black, Black, 2009). There will be an analysis on the climate data to discover the cause of the various trends (Brons, Pels, Nijkamp, Rietveld, 2012).   

Without air transport forecast many sectors are left in the dark on what to expect in the future on the trends of aircrafts and passengers (De’Neufville, 2015). Civil aviation authorities, airlines, organizations and individuals need air passenger traffic and aircraft forecast in carrying out their plans. Revenue management in the airlines is enhanced by accurate forecasts. Airline’s risk is significantly reduced by carrying out forecasts to determine demand in the air transport (Stohl, Eckhardt, Forster, James & Spichtinger, 2012). Lack of accurate forecast on air transport will make the civil authorities unable to efficiently plan decisions in air transport infrastructure. In order to carry out these forecast consideration is put on the airport passenger movement per month, airport aircraft movement per month, airport aircraft movement for years and the airport passenger movement for years (Hocking & Haddon, 2011).

Employment and GDP Contribution

In the past years many academic researchers have made multiple contributions to air transport forecasting in Australia but they have not done its comprehensively considering all aspects including passenger movements, aircraft movements and the climatic conditions in the various airports (Xia, Nitschke, Zhang, Shah, Crabb & Hansen, 2015).

• Analyze given data with the aim of finding the patterns, trends to help in forecasting the number of passengers the airport may expect in the future to help different stakeholders in decision making.  
• Analyze climate data to find out the reasons for the trends in various airlines.
• To help stakeholders to make better informed decisions by assessing where the air transport industry is headed in both the long term and short term period.

Analyses Undertaken Using the Available Datasets include:

• Total number of the passengers movement in Australia from 1985 to 2017
• Total number of aircraft movement in Australia from 1985 – 2017
• Movement of passengers in Australia for different types of airlines
• Inbound of aircraft in different states in Australia
• Inbound of aircrafts over the years
• Outbound of aircrafts for different airports in Australia
• Inbound of the international passengers in different months in different cities
• The city and the month wise results for the inbound of the air passengers in Australia
• Total inbound for different Airports in different cities in Australia
• Outbound of the air passengers from different cities in Australia in different months
• Inbound total, outbound total and total number of passengers in different cities in Australia
• Inbound of total inbound from the year 1985 – 2017
• Total outbound of the passengers in Australia
• Results for inbound and outbound month wise
• Forecasting of the inbound passengers in Australia
• Forecasting of outbound aircrafts in Australia  (Graham, 2008)

According to Cheng (2009) in 2014 the Australian air transport employed more than 170,000 people. The passengers in the airports bought services and goods in the year leading to the supporting of a further 100,000 jobs. By paying salary to its employees the sector supported a further 60,000 jobs almost all being spent on consumer services and goods. Foreigners using the Australian airports in the year are estimated to have supported a further 290,000 jobs (Cheng, 2009). Both the air transport industry and foreign tourists contributed an estimate of $64.3 billion to the gross value added contribution to the Australian GDP this amounts to 4.5% of the economy. Air transport in Australia facilitates tourism, exports, and foreign direct investment.  In 2014 Australia exported US $300 billion worth of services and goods which were facilitated by air transport (Cheng, 2009).

The air transport sector connects Australia to other countries both developed and undeveloped this helps drive economic growth. According to available statistics there are sixteen direct flights terminuses amongst the twenty fastest developing countries in the world (Bryce, 2013).  There are also twenty direct flight destinations to the twenty fastest growing cities in the world as measured using GDP. North America and Europe are the biggest sources of inbound passengers to Australia (Hooper, 2008).  

The total inbound and outbound of aircraft in Australia is almost 1.4 million with three of its airports ranked in the top hundred in the world airports ranking based on passenger numbers. Some of the top airports in Australia are Kingsford Smith, Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide international. Airports in Australia are categorized into domestic, international and regional (Laird, 2009).

In the trends of regional aviation, there has been an increase in the number of passenger’s schedules at the regional airports. From the year 1984 to the year 2005 passenger movement rose from 8.5 million to around 17.5 million which add ups to 3.5 %. On the other hand, the number of airports have dropped from 278 in the year 1984 to 170 airports in 2005 (Laird, 2009). The movement of passengers was seen to increase in every ASGC remoteness grouping. The number of regional airports which are served in every ASGC remoteness class in regional Australia dropped.  In the past years, Australia have experienced decline in the amount of regional airports attended by airlines, followed by secluded Australia external regional Australia and inner regional Australia (Forsyth, 2008, 2009, 2017). Nevertheless, in spite of the substantial drop down over time, the amount of airports in very distant Australia remained high compared to those in other AGSC remoteness classes are district areas.

Connectivity and Economic Growth

 There was a substantial dropdown in the number of airline services at the regional airports. The rate of market awareness has advanced over time (Wheeler & Wheeler 2015). Back in the 80’s regional airports were served by 52 airlines and managed about 8.5 million passengers’ revenue. An important stir has also been observed in regional airports serving airlines over the years. Only five airlines out of 34 serving regional airports are still offering services since 1984 (Ison, Merkert & Mulley, 2014). Single operators have however been serving more than half of the regional airports over the past 22 years.  Despite the fact that there was double the number of passengers in 2005 as compared to 1984, the number of flight was lower in the year 2005 than in 1984. Before 1990, aircrafts which had fewer than 18 seats operated an average of 40% of the scheduled flights both outbound and inbound to regional airports. In the year 1994, aircrafts with 30 to 100 seats were introduced and the industry is strategizing at using larger aircraft to serve regional airports (Mulley, Nelson, Tead, Wright & Daniels, 2012).

The amount of passengers has risen on regional air routes. A significant upward trend has been observed from 6.5 million in the year 1984 to 16 million in the year 2005. There was a downward trend in the number of regional air routes that dropped in the year 1984 to 2005 from 816 to 415 routes (Hancock, 2007).  Many air routes were modernized over the year. On the other hand, distribution of air routes in 2005 was significant with the flight frequency of regional air routes providing an average about three return flights every week. The route density transported fewer than 1000 revenue passengers annually. About 80% of regional air routes travelled a distance of 1000km or less (Zhang & Zhang 2013).

According to Stevens (2006) about 90 percent of the population was within access point to at least one of the airports in Australia (Stevens, 2006). Seven percent of the population had an access to medium, small and rural airports while only 3 percent of the population had no close access to the airport. At most 92 percent of people living around large airports earned $ 400 to $600. Passenger movement (Blow, 2012). Access points to the airports that were anticipated with negative passenger movements increased with increase in population. Also population with a smaller revenue is higher with negative estimated passenger movement than airports with positively proposed passenger movements (Hooper, 2008). Air services. According to the flight frequency, about 95 % of the population gave at least more than four return flights per day. Medium airports with a coverage of 4.72 % of the population gave at least one or more daily return flights. 85 % of small airports gave at least one daily return flight (Black, Black, 2009).

Trends in Regional Aviation

A research article written by Yukun Bao, Tao Xiong and Zhongyi Hu (2013) focusses on the use of an Ensemble empirical mode decomposition EEMD in the calculation of air transport forecast. They state that this method is an improvement of the empirical mode decomposition EMD being used for calculation owing to the fact that it does not include mode mixing. In using the EEMD for forecasting the existing air passenger traffic in the UK and the US were decomposed into a small and finite numeral of a residual and an intrinsic mode functions IMF using slope based formula. The components of IMF were then extracted through EEMD with each component being modelled by an independent support vector machines SVM, finally another independent SVM was used to aggregate the forecast of all components. In this calculation monthly air transport data of 6 airlines in both the US and the UK was used (Bao, Hu & Xiong, 2013).

In recent decades the aviation industry in Australia has faced a major debate on the competence of programmed air flights both inbound and outbound from regional societies (Gunaratnam, Tobin, Seale, Marich & Mc-Anulty, 2014). Various policy makers in the country’s different organizations have faced matters concerning the accessibility, viability and sustainability of some of the parts in the country (Lepani, Freed, Murphy & Mc-Givillary, 2009). There is need for a detailed research with the aim of informing the industry and policy development (Collyer, Barnes, Churchman, Clarkson & Steiner, 2014). This should be done by ensuring the research provides a better comprehension of the state of the air transport industry, pointing out essential issues and trends.

Various types of relevant literature have been reviewed on the artefact addressing the project problem efficiently. In the project data has been gathered on the inbound and outbound of aircraft in Australia. The data has been fed to the Microsoft excel software and analysis done on it with the aim of addressing the problem statement which is to discover trends and patterns in air transport in Australia in order to help in forecasting (Gaudry & Mayes, 2012).

The analysis is done based on the fact that the Australian air transport industry is important to the economy and the globe since it has a significant impact. It is assumed that a significant number of stakeholders will find the data analysis and discussion important in making their decisions related to the Australian air transport industry (May, Hill, 2006).

Forecasting Air Transport

It is assumed that the data used in this project which has been gathered from various online sources is accurate and thus can be relied on by the various stakeholders who have been discussed in the problem statement.

The use of Ensemble empirical mode decomposition EEMD in the calculation of air transport forecast has been employed. In using the EEMD for forecasting the existing air passenger traffic in Australia is decomposed into a small and finite numeral of a residual and an intrinsic mode functions IMF using slope based formula. The components of IMF are then extracted through EEMD with each component being modelled by an independent support vector machines SVM, finally another independent SVM is used to aggregate the forecast of all components. In this calculation monthly air transport data of 6 airlines in Australia is used (Bao et al., 2013).

All these assumptions and formulae are applied to come up with a dependable analysis on the air transport tends in the Australian air transport industry. The results from the calculations and analysis play a significant role when various stakeholders make decisions (Harris, Pattiaratchi, Cole & Keene). 

The data used in this project is in excel comprising the aircraft movement data of Australian cities and passenger movement data. Graphs have been designed in excel on the above data to show the trends. The graphs were created using the following procedure:

• The data from online sources on the various airlines in Australia is entered in Excel.  
• In the creation of the graphs there is a choice on what graph and chart to create.
• The data is highlighted and the desired graph is inserted as shown in the excel files.
• The data is aligned properly on the desired axes.
• The layout and colors are adjusted to achieve the desired outlook.
• The size of the graph’s axis and legend labels is adjusted.  
• The graphs are titled according to the data (Kelly, Blyde & Denney, 2008).

The key data source for this project was the Air Transport Statistics database sustained by the Aviation Statistics Section of BITRE (Laws, 2012). The source comprises an assembly of statistical returns gathered for domestic, international and regional airports since 1985. The website www.bom.gov.au has been used to obtain climate data to help in explaining the various transport trends in both the international domestic and regional airports. 

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9/18/2018

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Project Proposal

Obtaining Data From Secondary Sources

Data Analysis to Discover Trends

Forecasting

Preparing Power Point Slides

Presentation

 Table 1 : Gantt Chart

The graph 1 shows the annual passenger movement both inbound and outbound in Australia in a span of thirty-two years from 1985 to 2012 in the international and domestic airlines. There is a steady growth in the passenger movement in both airlines with the Domestic airlines leading. The reason why the domestic airline has a large number of passenger movement as compared to the international airline is because the international airlines only handle international flights in and out of Australia while the domestic airlines handle flights between airlines in Australia thus handle more passengers since there are more people travelling within the country as compared to outside the country (Nelson, 2014). In 1988 to 1989 there was a decline in passenger movement owing to the recession in Australia which was as a result of Japan and West Germany increasing interest rates leading to the increase of interest rates by the US (Prideaux, 2008). This resulted in stock market crash globally and Australia was affected. In 2000 to 2002 there was a slight decline in the passenger movement in both airlines due to the outbreak of the SARS disease in some countries and the September 11 attack in the US (Williams, 2016). From 2002 onwards the graph shows a steady increase in the passenger movement owing to the growth of the Australian economy and most world economies in this period (Rimmer, 2012), 2017 recorded the highest level of passenger movement while 1988-1989 recorded the lowest passenger movement. From the graph it can be depicted that Domestic airports handled most of the passengers over the period of 1985 to 2017 followed by International airlines. This trend is consistent over the years with the domestic airline showing a large passenger increase from 2002 onwards compared to the other airlines (Schuster, 2009). The international airline maintains a steady increase over the years with a slight decrease in the period of 2001 to 2002. The gap between the domestic and the international airlines is very large thus majority of passengers use the domestic airlines. This is due to the fact that the number of passengers who travel within Australia is higher than those who travel out or into the country (Yigitcanlar, Fabian & Coiacetto, 2008).  

Research on Air Transport Forecasting

The table 2 above shows the average total Annual growth of passenger movement from 20012-2017 is 2.4%, from 2007-2017 its 3.2% and from 1997-2017 its 4.2%

This shows that there was more growth 1997 to 2017 at 4.2% as compared to the past five years 2012-2017.  The positive growth over the years shows that the Australian Air transport sector is growing and contributing positively to the country’s GDP. This positive growth can be used to forecast a positive growth in the future (Starkie, 2016).  

The graph 2 shows the annual aircraft movement both inbound and outbound in Australia in a span of thirty-two years from 1985 to 2017. There is a steady growth in the aircraft movement. In 1988 to 1989 there was a decline in aircraft movement in 1999 to 2001 there were a slight decline in the aircraft movement. From 2001 to 2002 there is a steady number of passenger movement in Australia. There is a slight passenger movement decline from 2008-2009. 2017 recorded the highest level of aircraft movement.    

1985-2017 Total Australian Passenger Movement Based on Airport Type

The airports in Australia are categorized into Regional, Domestic and International airports. The graph shows the total number of passengers in millions who used the various types of airports.

1985-2017 Top Ten Airports in Australia

Ten cities were considered in the analysis of the Australian airports among which are Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, Adelaide, Gold Coast, Cairns, Canberra, Darwin, Hobart, Others.

SYDNEY

Sydney is one of the major cities in Australia having both international and domestic airlines. 

From the graph 3 it can be depicted that Domestic airports in Sydney handled most of the passengers over the period of 1985 to 2017 followed by International airlines. This trend is consistent over the years with the domestic airline showing a large passenger increase from 2002 onwards compared to the other airlines. The international airlines maintain a steady increase over the years with a slight decrease in the period of 2001 to 2002 and 1989 to 1990, there is also a similar decrease in the domestic airlines (Stevens, 2006).

The table 3 shows that there is a positive growth in the passenger movement from 2016 to 2017 in the domestic and international airlines.

Melbourne is a major city in Australia and plays an important role in its economy. 

From the graph 4 it can be shown that Domestic airports handled most of the passengers over the period of 1985 to 2017 followed by International airlines. This trend is consistent over the years with the domestic airline showing a large passenger increase from 2002 onwards compared to the other airlines. The international airlines maintain a steady increase over the years with a slight decrease in the period of 2001 to 2002 (Walker & Stevens, 2008).

The table 4 shows that there is a positive growth in the passenger movement from 2016 to 2017 in all airline types

BRISBANE  

From the graph 5 above it shows the airline types in Brisbane city it can be noted that Domestic airlines handled most of the passengers over the period of 1985 to 2017 followed by International airlines. This tendency is steady over the years with the domestic airline showing a large passenger increase from 2002 onwards compared to the other airline. There is a slight decline in the periods of 1987 to 1989 and 2000 to 2002 in the domestic and the international airlines.

Percentage Growth

The table 5 above shows that there is a positive growth in the passenger movement from 2016 to 2017 in the domestic and international airlines.

Perth is a major airline transport hub in Australia.

From the graph 6 above it can be depicted that Domestic airports handled most of the passengers over the period of 1985 to 2017 followed by International airlines. This trend is consistent over the years with the domestic airline showing a large passenger increase from 2002 onwards.

The table 6 above shows that there is a positive growth in the passenger movement from 2011 to 2012 in all airline types.  

Adelaide is one of the major cities in Australia in terms of growth and GDP. 

From the graph 7 it can be depicted that Domestic airports in Adelaide handled most of the passengers over the period of 1985 to 2017 followed by the International airlines. Both airlines maintain a steady increase over the years with a slight decrease in the period of 2001 to 2002 and 1987 to 1989.

The table 7 shows that there is a positive growth in the passenger movement from 2016 to 2017 in the regional and international airlines.

From the graph 8 of Gold Coast city, it can be depicted that Domestic airlines handled most of the passengers over the period of 1985 to 2017 followed by International airlines. This trend is consistent over the years with the domestic airline showing a large passenger increase from 2002 onwards compared to the other airlines. This large gap between the domestic and international airline shows that majority of the passengers preferred the domestic airlines to international airlines.

The table 8 shows that there is a positive growth in the passenger movement from 2016 to 2017 in all airline types

From the graph 9 it can be interpreted that Domestic airports handled most of the passengers over the period of 1985 to 2017 followed by International airlines. From 2002 there was a sharp rise in the domestic airlines and a sharp decline in the international airlines thus increasing the gap between the two.  

The table 9 shows that there is a positive growth in the passenger movement from 2016 to 2017 in all airline types

Canberra is one of the major cities in Australia. 

From the graph 10 it can be depicted that Domestic airports handled most of the passengers over the period of 1985 to 2017 in Canberra followed by the International airlines. The international airlines recorded a zero passenger movement except from 2015 onwards. The domestic airlines maintain a steady increase over the years with a slight decrease in the period of 2001 to 2002, 1988 to 1989 and 2009 to 2012 (Whelan, Nguyen, Hajkowicz, Davis, Smith, Pyke and Markes, 2012).

The table 10 shows that there is a decline in the passenger movement from 2016 to 2017 in all airline types with international airlines recording a percentage of zero in most of the years.  

In Darwin city the situation is almost the same as the other cities, from the graph 11 it can be depicted that Domestic airports handled most of the passengers over the period of 1985 to 2017 followed by International airlines. This trend is consistent over the years with the domestic airline showing a large passenger increase from 2002 onwards compared to the other airlines. The domestic airlines maintain a steady increase over the years with a slight decrease in the period of 2001 to 2002, 2008-2009, and 1988 to 1989. There is a significant decline in the international airlines in the period of 2000 to 2006.

The table 11 shows that there is a positive growth in the passenger movement from 2016 to 2017 in all airline types

Hobart is one of the major airlines in Australia 

From the Hobart passenger movement graph 12 above it can be depicted that Domestic airports handled most of the passengers over the period of 1985 to 2017 followed by International airlines. The international airlines recorded a near zero passenger movement. This trend is consistent over the years with the domestic airline showing a large passenger increase from 2002 onwards compared to the other airlines. There is a decline in the domestic airlines in the period 1989 and 2002.

Percentage Growth

The table 12 shows that there is a positive growth in the passenger movement from 2016 to 2017 in the domestic airlines with the international airlines recording a zero growth.

The graph 13 above is a representation of all the other cities in Australia. From the graph it can be depicted that Domestic airports handled most of the passengers over the period of 1985 to 2017. The international airlines handled very few passengers thus there is a large gap between the two. There are sharp declines in the domestic airlines in the period of 1989, 2002 and 2009.

The table 13 shows that there is a positive growth in the passenger movement from 2016 to 2017 in all airline types.

The graph 14 above shows the revenue per passenger movement on the top air transport cities in Australia. Sydney is leading followed by Melbourne, Brisbane and then Perth. In all the cities the months of November to January showed the highest RPT April, May and June showed the lowest RPT. This is due to the fact that between November and December people are on holiday and in December there are the Christmas festivities and later on in January there is the New Year festivals. Contrary to this in April, May and June most people are at work.

The graph 15 shows the annual passenger movement both inbound and outbound in Australia in a span of twenty-seven years from 1985 to 2012.

There is a steady growth in the passenger movement.

In 1988 to 1989 there was a decline in passenger movement.

In 2000 to 2002 there were a slight decline in the passenger movement.

From 2002 onwards the graph shows a steady increase in the passenger movement.

2012 recorded the highest level of passenger movement at about 140, 000,000 while 1988-1989 recorded the lowest passenger movement at 30,000,000 aircrafts. 

The table 14 above shows the average Annual growth of passenger movement from 2007-2012 is 4%, from 2002-2012 its 6.4% and from 1992-2012 its 5.4%

This shows that there was more growth between 2002 to 2012 at 6.4% as compared to the past five years between 2007 and 2012.    

The positive growth over the years shows that the Australian Air transport sector is growing and contributing positively to the country’s GDP.

This positive growth can be used to forecast a positive growth in the future.  

The graph 16 shows the annual aircraft movement both inbound and outbound in Australia in a span of twenty-seven years from 1985 to 2012.

There is a steady growth in the aircraft movement.

In 1988 to 1989 there was a decline in aircraft movement.

In 1999 to 2001 there were a slight decline in the aircraft movement.

From 2001 to 2002 there is a steady number of passenger movement in Australia.

From 2002 onwards the graph shows a steady increase in the passenger movement.

There is a slight passenger movement decline from 2008-2009.

2012 recorded the highest level of passenger movement at about 140, 000,000 while 1988-1989 recorded the lowest passenger movement at 30,000,000 aircrafts.

The table 15 above shows the average Annual growth of passenger movement from 2007-2012 is 3.1%, from 2002-2012 its 3.0% and from 1992-2012 its 1.3%

This shows that there was more growth between 2007 to 2012 at 3.1% as compared to the past ten years between 2002-2012 but the difference is slight at 0.1%

The positive growth over the years shows that the Australian Air transport sector is growing and contributing positively to the country’s GDP.

This positive growth can be used to forecast a positive growth in the future.  

The airports in Australia are categorized into Regional, Domestic and International airports. The graph shows the total number of passengers in millions who used the various types of airports. 

From the graph 17 above it can be depicted that Domestic airports handled most of the passengers over the period of 1985 to 2012 followed by International airlines which is lagged by the Regional airlines.

This trend is consistent over the years with the domestic airline showing a large passenger increase from 2002 onwards compared to the other airlines.

The regional and the international airlines maintain a steady increase over the years with a slight decrease in the period of 2001 to 2002. 

Percentage Growth 

The table 16 above shows that there is a positive growth in the passenger movement from 2011 to 2012 in all airline types

Ten airports were considered in the analysis of the Australian airports among which are Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, Adelaide, Gold Coast, Cairns, Canberra, Darwin, Hobart, Others

SYDNEY

Sydney is one of the major airlines in Australia 

From the graph 18 above it can be depicted that Domestic airports in Sydney handled most of the passengers over the period of 1985 to 2012 followed by International airlines which is lagged by the Regional airlines.

This trend is consistent over the years with the domestic airline showing a large passenger increase from 2002 onwards compared to the other airlines.

The regional and the international airlines maintain a steady increase over the years with a slight decrease in the period of 2001 to 2002.

Percentage Growth 

The table 17 shows that there is a positive growth in the passenger movement from 2011 to 2012 in the domestic and international airlines.

The Regional airlines show a decline in the period of 2011 to 2012.

MELBOURNE

Melbourne is one of the major airlines in Australia 

From the graph 19 above it can be depicted that Domestic airports handled most of the passengers over the period of 1985 to 2012 followed by International airlines which is lagged by the Regional airlines.

This trend is consistent over the years with the domestic airline showing a large passenger increase from 2002 onwards compared to the other airlines.

The regional and the international airlines maintain a steady increase over the years with a slight decrease in the period of 2001 to 2002.

Percentage Growth 

The table 18 above shows that there is a positive growth in the passenger movement from 2011 to 2012 in all airline types

OTHERS 

From the graph 20 above it can be depicted that Domestic airports handled most of the passengers over the period of 1985 to 2012 followed by regional airlines which is lagged by the international airlines.

This trend is consistent over the years with the domestic airline and the regional airlines showing a large passenger increase from 2002 onwards compared to the international airlines.

The regional and the international airlines maintain a steady increase over the years with a slight decrease in the period of 2001 to 2002.

Percentage Growth 

The table 19 above shows that there is a positive growth in the passenger movement from 2011 to 2012 in all airline types except the international airlines that show a negative growth in the period.

The results from the graph on the outbound of passengers from Australia shows that there will be a decline in the outbound of aircraft followed by an increase after a few years (Jones, 2006). There is a high fluctuation in the outbound of aircraft in Australia (International Air Transport Association, 2015). The positive trend in all the cities of Australia shows that there will be an even further increase in the number of aircraft and passengers handled in all the Australian airlines (Gardner & Sarker, 2013). 

The trends in the analysis made above show that in all the Australian airlines both the domestic and international airlines there has been a consistent growth in the number of aircrafts they handle and in the passenger movement in all the major cities in Australia. However, there are declines in all the airlines in the years 1989 and 2002-2003. The decline in 1989 was due to the recession in Australia which was instigated by Japan and West Germany and the US due to their action of increasing interest rates this led to the stock market crash that impacted Australia negatively. The 2002-2003 decline was due to the outbreak of the SARS disease and the USA September 11 attack. Despite this challenges the air transport industry in Australia has had a consistent expansion of its service worldwide. The results show that the industry has a potential of even expanding further in the coming years.

• Obtaining the data of some of the cities was problematic since it’s scattered online on various secondary sources.
• The forecast may not be accurate due to unforeseen dangers which may arise and affect the Australian air transport sector.

The government and the air transport industry must be ready to encounter any challenge that affects the Australian air transport industry such as the decline due to the stock market crash. This will ensure consistency in the growth of the industry. Air transport companies can reduce their transport costs during the peak moths of October and November and channel the resources to advertisements during the off peak moths of April, June and May.  

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