CAA reveals contrasting fortunes for Manchester and Liverpool airports
THE region’s two major airports encountered contrasting fortunes in 2012 according to figures from the Civil Aviation Authority.
While Manchester’s passenger numbers rose a healthy 4.5%, an increase of 847,000 to 19.7 million, Liverpool John Lennon flew 15% fewer passengers during the year. Passenger numbers at JLA fell 788,000 to 4.5 million – the largest absolute fall of any UK airport.
In total UK airports handled 221 million passengers during 2012, an increase of 0.6% or 1.4 million)on 2011. The growth continues the recovery started in 2011 following three consecutive years of falling passenger numbers at UK airports.
Despite the increase, passenger numbers for 2012 were still 8% below 2007’s peak of almost 240 million passengers and business passengers using the UK’s airports fell by 4%.
While London’s international hub Heathrow (+0.9% to a record 70 million) and Gatwick (+1.7%)also growing, passenger numbers at Stansted – acquired by Manchester Airport’s owner MAG for £1.5bn last month – fell -3.2% to 17.5 million, indicating the scale of the turnaround required at the Essex-based asset.
North West transport group Stobart’s Southend Airport performed well though, as passenger numbers surged from 42,000 to 617,000.
Iain Osborne, director of regulatory policy at the CAA, said: “Whilst our statistics show aviation performance in the UK continues to recover, the overall picture means passenger numbers in the UK are still some way short of their 2007 peak.
“There are still significant challenges ahead for the aviation industry. The economic climate, capacity and the environment are all issues that the industry must overcome to ensure it continues to offer passengers choice, value and high service standards.”
Commenting on the CAA statistics a Manchester Airport spokesman said: “The official numbers confirm the upward trend in passenger numbers we’ve witnessed here at Manchester over the last year. It’s come from across the airline network with growth from long haul carriers such as Emirates, Etihad, Virgin Atlantic and United and from a growing low cost base from airlines like Flybe, easyJet, Ryanair and Jet2.com.
“Our work doesn’t end here however which is why we’ve launched our ‘Fly Manchester’ campaign to encourage even more passengers from across the whole of the North to use our airport. With Moscow launching in the next few weeks, there’s lots to look forward to and we want to grow those numbers past the 20 million mark.”
A spokesman for Liverpool John Lennon Airport said the fall in passenger numbers was not a major surprise given a much-better than expected 2011 and a reduction in some services last year.
The spokesman added: “The difficult conditions have continued this Winter however we expect to see better performance in the second half of this year and remain optimistic for the future.
“Late last year Ryanair announced that they are to add new destinations to their Liverpool network this Summer and increase frequencies on a number of popular existing services, bringing the Airport an additional 180,000 passengers in 2013, whilst Norwegian commence their new Copenhagen service in April too.”
