The passenger traffic on interregional routes amounted to 72.1 thousand passengers from January 1 to March 23. In the same period last year, this figure stood at 42.8 thousand flyers, and from January 1 to March 23 of 2019, it was only 26.3 thousand travellers.
The number of flights on regional routes also increases for the second consecutive year. From January 1 to March 23 of 2019, there were 274 return flights from Strigino, with 333 flights during the same period in 2020. And in early 2021, the number of flights reached 441.
The main driver of interregional transportation explosion from Strigino is subsidies from the federal and regional budgets under Russian Government Resolution No. 1242. According to the decision of NN Region Governor Gleb Nikitin, RUB 37.7 million in 2019, RUB 142.8 million in 2020, and RUB 178.9 million in 2021 have been allocated from the regional budget to subsidize interregional flights from Strigino.
During 2020, flights on subsidised routes were operated by IrAero, SVT AERO, Azimut, Siberia and UTair Airlines to Ekaterinburg, Kazan, Krasnodar, Mineralnye Vody, Novosibirsk, Perm, Rostov-on-Don, Samara, St Petersburg, Sochi, Ufa and Chelyabinsk.
This year, Nizhny Novgorod Region’s government is co-financing flights on 11 interregional routes from Strigino, including flights to Astrakhan and Volgograd, and with the start of the summer season a new subsidised regular flight to Gelendzhik will be open for people of Nizhny Novgorod.
In accordance with Presidential Decree No. 204 dated 07 May 2018 “On national goals and strategic objectives for the Russian Federation development until 2024”, the Government of the Russian Federation and subnational authorities of Federation’s entities are instructed to ensure the extension of interregional scheduled passenger route network to 50 per cent of total domestic scheduled routes by 2024.
Today, the share of interregional destinations from Nizhny Novgorod in the total volume of domestic air travel already comes to 53%.