Amsterdam Airport Schiphol has marked a significant increase in the number of travellers passing through its doors this summer, claiming that it has almost returned to its 2019 levels.
According to a recent statement issued on September 8 by the airport, from July 7 to September 3, Schiphol welcomed 3.7 million departing passengers, handling an average of 1,339 aircraft movements per day and a total of 79,000 flights.
Based on this figure, the airport also noted that this summer season almost returned to its pre-pandemic levels.
“95 per cent of the departing passengers went through the security check within eight minutes. On average, the wait time at security control was three minutes. This is partly because travellers had prepared themselves well and because 1050 new colleagues started working in security. This is well above the target of 850,” the statement reads.
As Schiphol Airport explains, many travellers took advantage of the opportunity to reserve a specific time for their security check. As a result, over 668,000 time slots have been booked so far. The same authority revealed that a total of 98 per cent of those who used these reserved time slots expressed high levels of satisfaction with the service. In addition, Schiphol is also exploring extending the option to reserve time slots in the passport control and check-in processes.
This summer, London, Barcelona, and Istanbul emerged as the top choice for city trip destinations among travellers. Meanwhile, the countries most vacationers chose for their holidays this year, Spain, Great Britain, and Greece held the top three spots.
However, the successful management of the summer holidays does not give Schiphol reason for complacency, as in some cases, arriving travellers have experienced longer queues at passport control or delays in collecting their luggage than they would have preferred.
Thus, in July of this year, Amsterdam Airport Schiphol started collaborations with baggage handling companies to evaluate two innovative technologies designed to increase employee efficiency in the baggage handling hall.
One of the possibilities includes a robot explicitly developed for Schiphol, designed to lift suitcases instead of a baggage handler performing the same tasks.
A month later, Schiphol Airport made a decisive move after a successful two-week pilot project, purchasing 19 baggage robots to increase the efficiency of employees working in the baggage handling hall.
As the airport explains, these robots, custom-developed for Schiphol in just six months, are specifically designed to ease the physically demanding task of lifting luggage, a previously carried responsibility by human workers.
