The Air Bridge between Madrid and Barcelona, inaugurated in 1974 by Iberia as the first route of this type in Europe, turns 50, resisting competition from the high-speed train which, since it began linking both cities in 2008, has been gaining market share from the airplane, reaching the current 82%.
Currently, Iberia offers 86 weekly flights in each direction (172 in total) between Madrid and Barcelona, 14 daily on average during the week and 8 on Saturdays and Sundays, respectively, in which you can travel with both open tickets and closed tickets. .
However, the latter Depending on the contracted rate, they retain the flexibility of those open to change their flight on the fly, if there are places available in the one you want to take, from the Iberia App as many times as necessary and at no cost.
When the service was officially inaugurated on November 4, 1974, after three days in operation, there were 13 daily flights in each direction under an airlift regime, in addition to another four in reserve.
The year it was inaugurated, air traffic between the two cities was characterized by a high concentration of passengers at certain times of the day and by a considerable percentage of travelers who did not show up for their reserved flights.
Iberia looked for an alternative solution to reserving a place and to the prior assignment of seats, adapting daily flights to the strong demand of business travelers.
And so the air bridge was born, a totally new system in Europe, inspired by those already existing in Brazil and the United States, in which the passenger could buy his ticket and leave on the first available plane and without a seat reservation.
For almost 20 years, the then Spanish flag company operated the Madrid-Barcelona route alone, a monopoly that, after the liberalization of the air market, broke up the Scandinavian SAS in 1993, with a daily service between both cities, extension of its flight with Copenhagen, which was joined a year later by the Spanish Air Europa and Spanair.
With an offer of air bridge frequencies, both airlines began to compete with Iberia, with Spanair accounting for a third of the traffic in 2006.
Legal battle over the “Puente Aéreo” brand
After Air Europa began its regular flights between Madrid and Barcelona using the name “Puente Aéreo”, Iberia sued it in 1994, but, despite a first favorable ruling from a court in Palma, it finally lost the legal battle to exclusively use said brand.
In 1996, the Provincial Court of Palma de Mallorca accepted an appeal filed by Air Europa against the previous ruling that gave Iberia exclusivity of the brand.
After an appeal was filed by the latter before the Supreme Court, it confirmed in 2002 the ruling of the Court of Palma de Mallorca, according to which, Iberia did not have exclusive ownership over the expression “Air Bridge” because it is a generic term. and common in air traffic that was not the creation or invention of this company.
The sentence explained that it is completely public knowledge that said term It appeared in the German city of Berlin during the Cold War for supply due to the need created by the closure of access to it decreed by the Soviet Union.
According to the Supreme Court, the definition of “Air Bridge” contained in the dictionary of the Royal Spanish Academy “regards the reasonable use that is made of it in daily life, without express reference to either the appellant company or the Madrid-Barcelona route. “.
And he concluded that “air bridge means frequent transportation of people and things between two cities and both words are generic, not only because the dictionaries say so but because it is a vulgarized expression both in Spain and in other countries and this has been the case for almost fifty years.”
From the most profitable business to the most loss-making
As a result of the economic crisis and competition from high-speed rail, the Air Bridge went from being Iberia’s most profitable business to the most profitable and the company was on the verge of closing it due to the losses it generated.
In 2017, Iberia partnered with Vueling to operate the airlift with a total of 26 flights between both companies (16 from Iberia and 10 from Vueling), one of the novelties being that travelers could book their flights, thus coexisting open tickets and tickets with reservation.
After the health crisis, Iberia has returned to operating the service alone, recovering pre-pandemic capacity and resisting competition from high-speed rail, which has been increasing in recent years with the entry of new operators such as Ouigo and Iryo.
Since the liberalization of rail transport, which became effective in 2021 when Ouigo began operating between Madrid and Barcelona, The train has gained 20 percentage points of share over the plane.
Iberia highlights that airlift customers can make a seat reservation to secure the flight of their choice or fly with open tickets, and that they have specific facilities, close to the boarding gates, which allows them to arrive up to 20 minutes before of the soft plane departure and Maximize the advantage of “arriving and flying” that offers this product.
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