Unintended trajectories: liberalization and the geographies of private business flight

The global commercial aviation industry has undergone significant regulatory reform during the last 30years. This paper explores something of the relationship between air transport liberalization and thegrowth of private business aviation and suggests that the sector’s development is largely an unintendedconsequence of the increasingly deregulated operating environment in that it has developed to overcomesome of liberalization’s negative impacts, including delays, congestion, and perceptions of poor customerservice. We argue that liberalization has created innovative market opportunities for private businessaviation and illustrate how the sector’s operating models are facilitating new, as yet largely undocumented,forms of aerial mobility. The paper examines: the advantages of private business aviation overscheduled services; business strategies in the sector, especially the idea of fractional jets; the impact ofnew technologies, particularly the Very Light Jet (VLJ); and, finally, employs Europe as an example of thespatialities of private business aviation.