According to a report from Birmingham Airport, 2014 was recorded as the busiest year ever. The airport handled over nine million passengers for the twelve months, with the highest number being recorded in December 2014. This translates to a 6.5% increase compared to the previous year 2013. Between April and December, the airport recorded top routes as Dubai, Dublin and Amsterdam with December recording over 600,000 travellers using the airline. This translates to 8.4% increase compared to the previous year which was also the busiest since 2008.
The airport’s Chief Executive Officer, Paul Kehoe, said the airline experienced seven record months in 2014 which saw a major package of infrastructure works that prepared the airline for expansion. He also said that passengers using the route had increased significantly due to the introduction of new routes as well as ease of travelling to and from the airport. He assured their customers that 2015 will be more exciting with better and more improved services. This comes when the airline is preparing for American, Vueling and Norwegian airlines to start operations in summer.
The company expects that the Dubai route will overtake the Dublin route as the busiest route in 2015. Emirates are set to launch another daily service where Turkish, SAS, Air India, Thomson among other airlines will be given more capacity and travellers can expect more choice from Birmingham in this year than ever.
In December 2014, international services had the highest number of passengers. The airport recorded 464, 190 passengers who took flight from there. This is 10.7% increase as compared to the previous year 2013. Traffic schedule also rose by 8.6% in the year 2014. Most of the flights headed to Hamburg, Stuttgart, Las Palmas, Knock and Alicante. Traffic schedule in December 2014 accounted for a total of 91% while charter passengers accounted for the remaining 9%.