Zurich LSZH: a slot for every flight, and in WEF week a 2-hour limit on the ground

The slot before the flight, not after

At Zurich every IFR movement needs an airport slot allocated in advance: for the flight with passengers, for the empty positioning flight, for training and for flights into or out of maintenance. Business aviation does not request it from the Swiss slot coordinator: the handling agent does, chosen from those listed in the Swiss AIP, and passes on the slot ID to be entered in field 18 of the flight plan. If the plan changes, the slot must change too, and use is monitored. For the passenger it means one simple thing: the take-off time from London or Paris is decided together with the Zurich slot, not before it.

Night does not exist here

For slot allocation Zurich applies a curfew: no arrivals between 23:00 and 06:09, no departures between 22:46 and 05:44, Central European Time. The rule is written without margins: no exceptions are allowed. Charter flights have one more rule, the latest departure slot that can be allocated is 21:45. An hour of delay on departure, on a winter evening, can mean landing somewhere else or leaving the next day. That is why a quote for Zurich always carries a time and an alternate airport.

World Economic Forum week

In 2027 the World Economic Forum runs in Davos from 18 to 22 January, and Zurich is its airport. In that week Slot Coordination Switzerland allows a maximum of 2 hours of parking: the aircraft drops its passengers and leaves empty for an airport where it can stay. The return flight at the end of the week therefore becomes a second positioning flight, with its own cost, and it belongs in the quote from the start. Davos is 156 kilometres from the airport according to the tourist board. The same week Kitzbühel runs the Hahnenkamm, and the free aircraft across the whole alpine arc become fewer.

The airport for heading east

From Zurich the transfers go to eastern Switzerland and the Arlberg: Davos at 156 kilometres and Klosters at 146 according to their tourist board, Lech-Zürs at 190 kilometres and about two and a quarter hours, St. Moritz three hours by road or rail. For Gstaad, Verbier, Crans-Montana and Zermatt, Zurich is a further alternative than Geneva or Sion, useful when you arrive from the east or when the Valais airports are full. For the Lauberhorn at Wengen, which is car-free, the direct train to Interlaken Ost takes about two hours, then 37 minutes to the village.

How we work

Alpine Private Jet works with Air-Dynamic, a Swiss company that arranges charter flights and operates helicopter and air ambulance directly. For Zurich the quote starts from the slot and the curfew: take-off time, alternate airport and, in Forum week, the empty positioning flight after the 2 hours on the ground are written in from the beginning. The intermediation fee is written into the quote. Quote in 1 minute.