Passenger numbers grow at BAA airports

BAA’s seven UK airports saw an 11.2% increase in passenger numbers to 8.8 million last month, due to rail service disruption and a recovery in passengers who did not travel in 1999 due to concerns about the Millennium date change.

BAA saw domestic traffic rise 14.3% in December due to the continued rail service disruption, giving a total of 150,000 more passenger movements, with over a quarter of whom travelled through Stansted.

Stansted and Southampton were the fastest growing airports for December, with Stansted up 31.1% and Southampton showing an increase of 16.5%.

Gatwick saw a 12.8% increase in passenger numbers, with Heathrow growing by 7.5%. The Scottish airports; Glasgow, Aberdeen and Edinburgh, recorded a collective increase of 10.8% despite bad weather over the Christmas period.

European charter traffic for the seven airports grew last month by 12.4%, long haul (other than North Atlantic) rose by 15.5% and European scheduled services rose by 9.9%.

The most buoyant market sector for the year remained European scheduled traffic, accounting for 44.7 million passengers across the group.