London Stansted Airport’s GBP1 billion expansion programme – pumping up the volume

London Stansted Airport, 35 miles northeast of the UK capital, is its third busiest airport and will exceed 30 million passengers in 2024. It is regarded in some quarters as a downmarket sort of facility overrun with students and backpackers, mainly on account of the overwhelming presence of low cost airlines, led by Ryanair.

It is situated at the heart of overlapping designated economic areas that play host to much of the UK's economic development in new and breaking technologies. Despite that, it has few full service carriers and is heavily reliant on budget carrier business.

Nevertheless, it is ambitious to fulfil the travel requirements of that business community, as well as leisure travellers. While it will not be getting a second runway any time soon, it is about to benefit from a GBP1.1 billion infrastructure investment that will extend the existing terminal while keeping all the passengers under one roof.

The ever-changing nature of the air transport business requires close control of the design of such an extension to cater for evolving passenger demand, both on the ground and in the air, for flight connection facilities, and preparation for future pandemics and so on.

This report looks into these and other issues.