aviation - the past, present and future of flight

extended its reach. On May 7, 1966, the

09/27 runway in use today was first opened

(as 10/28). Twenty years later the original

terminal – often mooted for redevelopment

• was finally replaced by a new building on
  land to the south, much closer to the runway,
  thereby shortening taxi times.

TURNING POINT

In 1997 the airport reached what has turned

out to be a significant moment in its history.

easyJet, until then a provider of low-cost

services from Luton, expanded and set

up its second base at the airport starting

daily Boeing 737 flights from Liverpool to

Amsterdam and Nice on October 26.

These were a success and Geneva,

Barcelona, Belfast, Malaga, Madrid and

Palma were added throughout 1999, bringing

in nearly 1.4m passengers annually. New

routes to Paris and Alicante followed.

The growing relationship between airport

and carrier was cemented in 2000 with a

20-year agreement. The plan was to increase

passenger numbers and, by 2003, the airline

had based seven 737s there.

The airport expansion was facilitated by

infrastructure group Peel, who had bought a

76% share in the airport from British Aerospace

in July 1997. Peel quickly made its mark when

in 1998 work began on extending the main

apron by more than 49,000sq ft (15,000m²) as

well as starting construction of a new general

aviation parking apron, which opened in 1999.

This enabled long-term resident, Keenair,

to build a hangar to support its aircraft

http://www.aviation-news.co.uk 21

The former terminal, which is now

a hotel, with preserved aircraft on

the old apron. Martyn Cartledge/

aspphotography.net

EasyJet and Ryanair are the

main operators from Liverpool.

Key-Andy Martin

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