New flights operated by Turkish Airlines from Istanbul New Airport starting January 10, 2019

According to Routes Online, several Turkish Airlines flights will be opened from the new Istanbul Airport starting January 10, 2019. Even if the airport it’s not completed, and the full move-in was postponed to the end of March 2019, besides the already 5 destinations being operated from the New Istanbul Airport, from January 10 there will be more flights serviced from the new airport.

New routes to be operated from the Istanbul airport include several destinations: Ashgabat, Diyarbakir, Frankfurt, Gaziantep, Hatay, Kuwait City, London Gatwick, Moscow Vnukovo, Munich, Paris CDG, Tbilisi and Trabzon.

All the above flights are operated with narrow-body aircraft like Boeing 737 and Airbus A320/321. I am very much anticipating the new long-haul flights, but for those, it is to be expected a good feeder network to be successful.

Soft open with 5 flights in October 2018

The airport had a soft open on October 29, 2018 when the inauguration was held, celebrating the 95th Anniversary of the Turkish Republic.

Currently, from Istanbul New Airport there are operated some flights to Ankara, Antalya, Izmir, Trabzon, Adana and international destinations like Baku and Erevan.

Faster opening?

It is to be noted that these flights are new flights and are scheduled to be operated until the end of February. Some local media are reporting that despite the big move-in to the new airport being delayed to March 31, there is a posibility that the move-in to be held somewhere possibility the beginning of March.

That’s maybe why the above flights are listed to be operated only until the end of February.

The New Istanbul Airport will have a capacity of 90 million passengers annually and the airport will be furthermore extended to have a capacity of 150 million passengers.
The old Ataturk airport hit its limits and began to be crowded, so there is a logical expansion which will allow also Turkish Airlines to increase the number of flights. The new airport has 114 boarding gates, while the old one has only 41 gates.

The new airport its placed 35 kilometers north-west to Istanbul, on the European side of the city.