Manchester Airport passenger numbers down by 200,000

November 08, 2009

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PASSENGER numbers at Manchester Airport fell 11.1 per cent last month to just over 1.6m, new figures show.

The total number of travellers slipped from 1.8m.

Charter services saw the biggest fall, down 12.7pc to 515,106.

Andrew Harrison, commercial director for the airport, said: “As we’re seeing with the news from bmibaby and the announcement from British Airways last week, times are tough for the industry so the drop in passenger numbers in relation to last year isn’t a surprise.”

“We’re still looking at increasing our numbers for the winter season by attracting those looking for winter sun, or to take advantage of the ski season through Manchester,” he added.

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Mark, South Manchester (09/11/2009 at 09:58)

It's easy for Manchester Airport management to blame their "SLUMPING" passenger numbers on the recession, while simply refusing to consider their own shortcomings & poor strategic decisions.
Weren't Manchester Airport numbers "stagnant" for the last 5 years of the "economic boom"??

Chris , Davenport (09/11/2009 at 20:43)

Actually compared to LHR and LGW, Manchester is a great airport and we're lucky to have it. Despite the difficulties in the airline business the facilities continue to improve despite BA retreating to the south east. Although some carriers are dropping routes others are starting. Using the airport 2-3x a month I can only say that I see a lot of people working very hard to do a great job, day in day out. An 11% drop is significant but its nowhere near the end of the world. Thankfully our airport is owned by us and therefore perhaps we can have longer-term expectations focussed on the benefit to the north-west.

cheapside resident, middleton (10/11/2009 at 20:57)

I will be very reluctant to fly from Manchester again.It is neither user ,or family friendly,the baggage system is a joke,the place looks a dump,and the security measures are ridiculous. None of these problems at John Lennon Airport(and the travelling time to the airport from the North of Manchester ,is about the same),or even Yorks airports.
I wrote a detailed letter of complaint,when I last used Manchester Airport,in September 2009.Suffice it to say I have not received a reply.which combined with other problems and staff attitudes could well explain the BIG drop in passenger numbers.Without radical change ,this will continue .Fly via Mia ,no thanks I am going elsewhere.Cheapside resident

alfie20, south manchester (16/11/2009 at 17:24)

if Manchester airport have decent airlines operating sensibly timed / priced flights out of Manchester to Gran Canaria - and with decent leg room - then the winter sun seekers (and the rest of the year for that matter) - will see a good upturn in business. Current operators such as Thomas Cook are way too expensive, horrible seating leg room wise and times are not exactly sociable. The airline that gets these elements right will have an excellent upsurge of business - sadly missing at the moment to this particularly popular destination. Monarch is ok - but only starts late October - what about the rest of the year Monarch ?

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