Summer 2024 is expected to be the busiest summer season ever for Vancouver International Airport (YVR), exceeding pre-pandemic volumes.
In a bulletin this week, Vancouver Airport Authority states it is now expecting roughly 7.838 million passengers for the period between July 1 and September 30.
This is substantially up from the 7.18 million passengers recorded over the same period in 2023, and exceeds the previous all-time record of 7.61 million for the same period in 2019.
YVR is forecast to see an average of 85,196 passengers per day over these three summer months, when nearly 62,400 flights are scheduled.
The busiest day this summer is expected to be August 15 with 90,886 passengers, followed by August 19 with 90,856 passengers and September 2 with 90,812 passengers. This, of course, coincides with the seasonal return of residents following their summer travels, and the return of students just ahead of the start of the new school year.
This summer’s busiest routes will be Toronto (YYZ), Calgary (YYC), Montreal (YUL), and Edmonton (YEG) for domestic, Los Angeles (LAX), San Francisco (SFO), Las Vegas (LAS), New York (JFK), and Chicago (ORD) for US trans-border, and London (LHR), Hong Kong (HKG), Tokyo (NRT), Frankfurt (FRA), and Taipei (TPE) for international.
The busiest times to check in are expected to be 6 am to 1 pm and 8 pm to 10 pm for domestic, 5 am to 8 am and 10 am to noon for US trans-border, and 10 am to 1 pm for international.
The airport authority states it will be deploying additional staff, and optimizing its support teams and curbside greeting program.
YVR is already off to a very strong year, based on the latest full statistics available for passenger volumes. Over the first four months of 2024, the airport saw 8.03 million passengers — up from 7.4 million over the same period in 2023. This was the second highest passenger volume figure ever for the period between January and April, just behind the record of 8.13 million in 2019.
In 2023, YVR recorded 24.94 million passengers, marking its third highest total ever for passenger volumes — coming between the 24.17 million passengers seen in 2017 and 25.94 million passengers in 2018. So far in 2024, YVR is on pace to come close to its previous record of 26.38 million in 2019.