The works lasted exactly three months, just as planned: on Sunday 27 October, at 6 in the morning, the Milan Linate airport will reopen after a massive restyling operation, which will however be completed in 2021 with the restructuring of the internal spaces, to a total investment of over 70 million euros. This summer's is the second tranche of an operation that began in 2018 with the inauguration of the new facade, redesigned by the architect Pierluigi Cerri, and of the new Vip Lounge Leonardo, intended for the business clientele of the Milanese city airport. The interventions last year had cost 8,3 million, while the investment for those of this summer was just under 22 million, which involved the reconstruction of the take-off and landing runway, 2,4 kilometers long and 60 wide meters, and the taxiing one, as required by current legislation which requires maintenance every 15/20 years.
Another part of the work just completed involved the installation of the four new BHS (Baggage Handling System) systems, i.e. the system that manages suitcases and prepares them before boarding the plane: making a safer and more efficient the very often contested service alone cost 10,9 million euros of investment. The operation was completed successfully and on schedule, despite the controversy over the choice of the summer season - the one with the highest air traffic due to the holidays - and the risks of overcrowding at Malpensa airport, where all flights have been diverted thanks to the technical support of Enav, which has estimated a +50% of passengers in the Varese airport. Apart from the fact that travelers were asked - in this period - to show up at the airport earlier to avoid queues and inconvenience, there weren't any major problems in the end.
And in any case, as explained on the Sea website, the company that manages the Milanese airports and whose manager Armando Brunini has recently arrived at the helm, "this type of intervention is feasible only in the summer period, since the work on the runway and of its components requires a stable, clear weather, and a warm climate to be made at its best". Sea also mentioned that similar interventions were also carried out in 1982 and 2002, even in that case in the summer and even in that case with limited inconvenience. “Linate, having only one runway, was forced to interrupt its activities for some time. Malpensa, on the other hand, will never close, not even during any works, because it is equipped with two take-off and landing runways that allow it to function (albeit at a lower rate) even during runway reconstruction".
Linate now reopens and, Sea assures again, it will immediately be “100% functional”, although, as mentioned, in the meantime the works of the internal spaces are going on (refurbishment but also expansion), which will be completed in 2021 and which will cost - alone - over 27 million euros. The investment comes at an important moment for SEA, with the new management led by the president Michaela Castelli called to reduce a debt that increased again in the first half of 2019, exceeding 400 million euros. However, there are positive signals, both on the financial front and on that of passenger traffic: in the first six months of this year, compared to the same period of 2018, revenues increased by 7,3% to 362 million, and the net profit (which had also grown in 2017 and 2018) by as much as 15,2%, to 66,1 million.
Sea spa, which also holds shares of Orio al Serio airport and Aeropuertos Argentina, and whose majority share (54%) is owned by the Municipality of Milan, recorded this year – before the start of works at Linate – an increase in passengers of approximately 1 million compared to those of the first half of last year (+6,3%), thanks mainly to the Malpensa boom, which went from 11,3 to 12,5 million, a performance in proportion second only to that of the Paris hub Charles de Gaulles, while they grew less markedly Rome, Amsterdam, London and Frankfurt. Malpensa and Linate are once again confirmed as two of the main airports in the country: together with the main ones in the North-West (in particular Bergamo, Venice, Bologna, Genoa and Turin) they represent a third of total Italian passenger traffic.
