The Lufthansa subsidiary Air Dolomiti will no longer operate the Frankfurt am Main-Innsbruck route in the 2024 summer timetable. The Tyrolean Airport states that the reason for this is that the Kranich Group has capacity bottlenecks.
A replacement is not planned, at least for the 2024 summer flight schedule. Innsbruck Airport points out in a press release that travelers should have alternative connecting connections, for example via Vienna or Amsterdam.
In May 2022, after being temporarily canceled during the pandemic, the route was resumed with Innsbruck's new airline partner Air Dolomiti and operated on behalf of Lufthansa. The route has become well established, although there have been repeated operational difficulties due to the lack of staff in Frankfurt and the associated flight irregularities. According to Innsbruck Airport, Lufthansa would need Air Dolomiti's capacity on other routes in order to be able to compensate for the failures of the A320neo series. Innsbruck Airport is also affected by these temporary route cancellations - as of April 2024, the route to/from Frankfurt will be removed from the flight program until further notice.
“We very much regret the surprising cancellation of the route and thus the loss of the connection to the important Frankfurt hub,” said airport managing director Marco Pernetta in response to Lufthansa’s announcement. “In addition, we will be holding discussions with both existing and potential new airline partners in order to try to increase the frequency of existing feeder flights or to find a new partner for the Frankfurt route,” announces Pernetta.
For example, one would be conceivable in the future Takeover of the Frankfurt route by the South Tyrolean airline Skyalps, which will take place next summer 2024 for the tour operator Idealtours carry out the entire charter flight program from Innsbruck and will station an aircraft in Innsbruck for this purpose, according to Innsbruck Airport. There are similar hopes in Linz, because Air Dolomiti also discontinues the Frankfurt route in Upper Austria.