More than £1 billion is to be spent by Manchester Airports Group in terminal and airfield facilities in the next decade.
The investment is designed to allow its airports to play an even greater role in providing the runway capacity the UK needs in the coming years.
The work will cover Manchester and Stansted airports and follows a jump in passenger numbers in July.
Manchester, the only airport in the UK with two runways apart from Heathrow, grew 7.4% year-on-year to handle more than three million passengers last month.
It has now seen a record 27 million people pass through its three terminals in the last 12 months.
Work has started on a £1 billion transformation project which will allow it to make serve more passengers in its terminals and make fuller use of its current runway capacity.
Stansted handled 2.5 million passengers, up 10.5% over the same month in 2016.
The airport recently confirmed its attention to apply to lift its current ‘passenger cap’ from 35 million passengers a year to 44 million, allowing airlines to plan their future growth at London’s third airport.
The first stage of works is about to start to transform the current terminal building into a dedicated departures building, in advance of a new arrivals building being built next door.
The initial work will involve the creation of new check in space and seating areas in the terminal.
East Midlands airport grew by 3.1% to serve 588,000 passengers in July and Bournemouth airport grew 1.2% to handle 81,000.
Stansted asset management director Karen Smart said: “The airport has never been busier, so to help us keep pace with increased demand and improve the passenger experience, we have started a significant investment programme to deliver a wide range of projects over the next five years to transform the airport and support sustainable growth on our single runway.
“The centrepiece of this investment plan is the new £130 million arrivals building which was granted planning permission in April this year and will help transform our facilities to give our passengers the best possible experience.
“In addition, we will shortly begin a number of projects totalling £50 million to provide additional check-in capacity and add more seating in the departure lounge as well as increasing the number of aircraft parking stands on the airfield.
“This work will help improve customer service and add vital capacity during the period in advance of the new arrivals building becoming operational and the subsequent full transformation of existing terminal.”
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