London calling for Glasgow Prestwick

Glasgow Prestwick Airport airport shares its ambitions as part of World Routes 2017 attendance.

Q: What have been your most notable route successes?

• Eight percent increase in passenger numbers over the past 12 months
• Ability to deliver high-volume routes – the airport now serves three airports in the Barcelona region (BCN, REU, GRO)
• High network-wide load factors, eg. 15 of our 17 routes operated >90percent in July 2017. Highlights were Gran Canaria (98percent), Rome Ciampino (97percent) and Tenerife (97percent)
• Newly announced route to Rzezsow, advancing partnerships with local authorities utilising a ‘one team’ approach has ensured strong advance sales.

Q: What are you next targets for route development?

London - Glasgow Prestwick Airport is the closest airport for over half a million people and is accessible to 2.1 million people within a 60 minute drive.

Customers from Ayrshire should not need to drive past their local airport to another airport to reach London. Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) figures show that the number of people travelling from the Ayrshire area to London could sustain a daily route. Furthermore,

Glasgow Prestwick has the best surface access links of all the Scottish airports due to its excellent location directly off the M77 motorway and its railway station, which can be accessed from the terminal building. Utilising our train station provides the simplest journey between Glasgow Central Station and Central London, removing the necessity to travel by road to Glasgow International Airport.

Scotland has the highest propensity to fly in the UK, after London. Glasgow Prestwick’s success in high yield/high load factor summer sun makes us the ideal vacation airport of choice – with capacity available to expand upon this core market.

We previously hosted three direct Scandinavian routes, the only West of Scotland airport to do so. The direct market size previously sat in excess of 270k passengers per annum.

Some of the world’s biggest aerospace companies base themselves at Glasgow Prestwick Airport. The airport campus is an established centre of excellence for MRO, aero structures and design engineering. Over 3,000 highly skilled employees are based here – that’s more than 50percent of Scotland’s aerospace workforce. Some of the largest global aerospace companies have operations at Prestwick including, BAE Systems, Spirit Aerosystems, GE Caledonian, UTC and Woodward, Inc.

This creates numerous opportunities to link Glasgow Prestwick Airport to the European aerospace supply chain, such as Hamburg and Toulouse.

Q: What is your main message at World Routes?

“Revitalized airport, led by a new team, promoting cost effective access to the Scottish Market”.