Luton Airport - WikiHQ

London Luton Airport is an international airport in Luton, Bedfordshire, England. It is east of the town centre a company wholly owned by Luton Borough Council, and is operated by London Luton Airport Operations Limited (LLAOL). The airport, which was owned by the Borough of Luton, was considered to be the northern terminal for neighbouring London.

In the 1960s, Luton Airport played a key role in the development of the package holiday business, in which the popularity of the foreign holiday rose substantially, as the launch of new services had allowed greater numbers of people to travel abroad for the first time.

In 2004, the airport management announced that they supported the government plans to expand the facilities, which included a full-length runway and a new terminal. However, local campaign groups, including Luton and District Association for the Control of Aircraft Noise (LADACAN) and Stop Luton Airport Plan (SLAP) opposed the new expansion plans, for reasons including noise pollution and traffic concerns; LADACAN also claimed that various sites, including Someries Castle, a Scheduled Monument, would be threatened by the expansion. On 6 July 2007, it was announced that the owners of London Luton Airport had decided to scrap plans to build a second runway and new terminal for financial reasons. In order for the airport to expand further, the Department for Transport (DfT) advised the airport authority to use the airport site more efficiently. The DfT supports plans to extend the runway from its current length to and increase the length of the taxiway. A full-length runway would increase airlines' operational flexibility by enabling the use of aircraft that have a greater payload capacity and longer range than is currently possible. A longer taxiway would maximise runway use by reducing the need for taxiing aircraft to cross or move along the runway.

In January 2005, London Luton Airport Operations Limited was acquired by Airport Concessions Development Limited, a company owned by Abertis Infraestructuras (90%) and Aena Internacional (10%), both Spanish companies.

By 2006, the last flight training operator had ceased training from the airport.

From 2006 to 2008, Silverjet operated long-haul flights to Newark and Dubai from a dedicated terminal, but ceased operations due to the Great Recession.

In September 2016, La Compagnie announced it would cease operating its Luton to Newark service citing economic reasons. in addition to more than a dozen already served ones from other bases.

In December 2018, a three-year redevelopment of the airport commenced. Costing roughly £160million, the airport management stated that the upgrade, which included new shops, a new boarding pier, and more boarding gates, would increase overall capacity by 50%, enabling the site to accommodate 18 million passengers by 2020. Campaigners from local pressure groups such as LADACAN have complained that the airport had failed to incorporate noise reduction measures into the plan, while an airport spokesman stated "Our noise control measures are some of the most stringent of any major UK airport", noting that it had applied for additional flight restrictions. In addition, earlier that year, work had commenced on the construction of the Luton DART, an automated guided people mover which will travel between Luton Airport Parkway station and the airport.

Ownership

The airport remains in municipal ownership, owned by Luton Borough Council but managed by the private sector London Luton Airport Operations Limited (LLAOL). London Luton Airport has a Civil Aviation Authority Public Use Aerodrome Licence (Number P835) that allows flights for the public transport of passengers or for flying instruction. An indicator of the importance of the airport to the economy of Luton is that Luton is reported to have the highest number of taxicabs per head of population in the United Kingdom.

Facilities

thumb|Waiting area

thumb|Apron

thumb|Control tower next to Hangar 89, the [[easyJet head office]]

Terminal

Luton Airport has a single, two-storey passenger terminal building which has been expanded and rearranged several times. The ground floor has a main hall equipped with 62 check-in desks (1-62), a separate security screening hall, as well as some shops, service counters and the arrivals facilities. in three side piers (1-19, 20-28 and 30-43) can be found. Two airport lounges are located within the terminal. with a length of LLAL have outlined several options for the site of the new Terminal 2. Most of the proposals involve a development that will encroach upon Wigmore Valley Park, a designated County Wildlife Site; an alternative site to the east would encroach upon the London Green Belt, and a further option proposes siting a new terminal to the south of the runway.

Other tenants

EasyJet's head office is Hangar 89 (H89), a building located on the grounds of London Luton Airport; the hangar, a former Britannia Airways/TUI facility, is located from the former site of EasyLand, the previous headquarters of EasyJet. Hangar 89, built in 1974, has of office space and can house two aircraft the size of an Airbus A320 or Boeing 737 at one time. When EasyJet received H89, it had a 1970s style office setup. EasyJet modernised the building and painted it orange.

Additionally, the head office for TUI Airways was once located at the airport, and Monarch Airlines, along with the Monarch Group, was previously based in Prospect House on the airport grounds.

Airlines and destinations

Passenger

The following airlines operate regular scheduled and cargo flights to and from London–Luton:

Statistics

Traffic development

{| class="wikitable sortable" style="text-align:right; "

! style="width:75px"| Year!! style="width:100px"|Number of passengers!! style="width:125px"| Number of movements!! style="width:100px"| Freight <br /> (tonnes)

!1997

|3,238,458 || 63,586 || 21,354

!1998

|4,132,818 || 70,667 || 25,654

!1999

|5,284,810 || 79,423 || 23,224

!2000

|6,190,499 || 84,745 || 32,992

!2001

|6,555,155 || 83,707 || 23,070

!2002

|6,486,770 || 80,924 || 20,459

!2003

|6,797,175 || 85,302 || 22,850

!2004

|7,535,614 || 94,379 || 26,161

!2005

|9,147,776 || 107,892 || 23,108

!2006

|9,425,908 || 116,131 || 17,993

!2007

|9,927,321 || 120,238 || 38,095

!2008

|10,180,734 || 117,859 || 40,518

!2009

|9,120,546 || 98,736 || 28,643

!2010

|8,738,717 || 94,575 || 28,743

!2011

|9,513,704 || 97,574 || 27,905

!2012

|9,617,697|| 96,797 || 29,635

!2013

|9,697,944|| 95,763 || 29,074

!2014

|10,484,938|| 101,950 || 27,414

!2015

|12,279,176|| 116,412 || 28,041

!2016

|14,551,774|| 131,536 || 25,464

!2017

|15,799,219|| 135,538 || 21,199

!2018

|16,581,850|| 136,511 || 26,193

!2019

|18,216,207|| 142,011 || 29,093

!2020

|5,550,821|| 59,769 || 31,155

!2021

|4,674,800|| 41,650 || 25,545

!2022

|13,324,491|| 87,783 || 31,049

!2023

|16,195,068 || 128,443 || 26,043

!2024

|16,735,894 || 131,972 || 30,667

Busiest routes

{|class="wikitable sortable"

|+ Busiest routes to and from Luton (2025)

! Rank || Airport || Total<br />passengers || Change<br />2024/25

|1||Bucharest–Otopeni|| align="right" | 561,524|| 7.6%

|2|| Tirana ||align='right'| 502,085|| 15.5%

|3|| Amsterdam ||align='right'| 491,145|| 13.7%

|4|| Warsaw–Chopin ||align='right'| 453,417|| 1.1%

|5|| Budapest ||align='right'| 439,936|| 2.9%

|6||Palma de Mallorca ||align='right'| 427,507|| 19.3%

|7|| Dublin ||align='right'| 416,530|| 3.6%

|8|| Alicante ||align='right'| 370,213|| 10.5%

|9|| Málaga ||align='right'| 370,017|| 2.4%

|10|| Paris–Charles de Gaulle ||align='right'| 343,659|| 0.9%

Ground transport

Road

The airport lies a few miles away from the M1 motorway, which runs southwards to the M25 motorway and London, and northwards to Milton Keynes, the Midlands and the north of England. The airport is linked to M1's Junction 10 by the dual-carriageway A1081 road. There is a short stay car park adjacent to the terminal, together with medium and long term on airport car parks to the west and east of the terminal respectively and linked to the terminal by shuttle buses. Pre-booked off airport parking is also available from several independent operators.

Railway

thumb|Luton Airport Parkway station

has served the airport since 1999. It is on the Midland Main Line, which connects with the East Midlands; journeys to London can take as little as 22 minutes. The station is served by two train operating companies:

Govia Thameslink Railway is the primary operator, with regular stopping Thameslink-branded services to , , London St Pancras, , , and

East Midlands Railway operates semi-fast Luton Airport Express-branded services, which call at the station twice hourly. These trains run between London St Pancras and , via , Bedford and . Limited inter-city services to and stop here at peak times.

Airport transit

thumb|[[Luton DART airport transit]]

A light rail/automated guided people mover, Luton DART, provides a connection between the airport terminal and the railway station. The transit was officially opened by King Charles III in December 2022. It opened to passengers on 10 March 2023 operating a limited service for four hours per day, with the 24-hour service coming into effect around the end of the month. Shortly after, the DART transit replaced the shuttle bus service.

The single fare for the DART is £4.90. Rail tickets marked "Luton Airport" include the price of the DART transit. Concessions are given to Luton residents, and free travel is provided for holders of concessionary travel passes and disabled blue badge holders, and for airport workers.

Buses

thumb|The train2plane Luton Airport bus

thumb|The [[Luton to Dunstable Busway route]]

Local buses connect Luton Airport with Luton town centre and other nearby places.

The airport is served by Route A of the Luton to Dunstable Busway, a bus rapid transit route which connects the airport with Luton Town Centre and the neighbouring towns of Dunstable, Houghton Regis and Milton Keynes. The buses, operated by Arriva Shires & Essex, run on a segregated guided busway track between Luton and Dunstable.

Conventional bus services also operate, connecting the airport with towns and cities in the region and parts of north London, including the 100, operated by Arriva, which offers an hourly daytime connection to the nearby towns of Hitchin and Stevenage; Metroline service 84A; Courtney Buses coach service to Bracknell.

The first episode of the second series of the BBC sitcom One Foot in the Grave is entitled In Luton Airport No-One Can Hear You Scream.
Luton Airport was mentioned in the Piranha Brothers sketch from Monty Python's Flying Circus, as being the place where one of the brothers, Dinsdale, thinks that a giant hedgehog named Spiny Norman sleeps.
In 2011, the airport featured in an episode of the series Supersize Grime which focused on the cleaning of an Airbus A321 at the Monarch Aircraft Engineering hangar 127.
In 2022, YouTuber Max Fosh put up a giant text sign near Gatwick Airport saying "WELCOME TO LUTON" as a prank, causing passengers to believe that they had landed at Luton Airport instead.

Accidents and incidents

4 November 1949: A Hawker Tempest single-engined piston fighter being operated by Napier Aircraft on a test flight crashed at the airport, killing the test pilot.
3 March 1974: A Douglas DC-7C/F (registration: EI-AWG) operating an Aer Turas Teo charter flight from Dublin landed on runway 08 just after midnight but failed to achieve reverse thrust. Normal braking application also appeared to the crew to be ineffective and the emergency pneumatic brakes were applied. All main wheel tyres burst. The aircraft overran the runway and continued over the steep bank at the eastern perimeter finally coming to rest in soft ground beyond. The situation had also been made worse by an inadvertent application of forward thrust by the crew in trying to achieve reverse thrust. Three of the six passengers and two of the four crew were injured. The aircraft was badly damaged and deemed a write-off. The subsequent investigation revealed that the aircraft only just became airborne at the end of the runway, and as the ground fell away to the Lea valley below, the aircraft actually followed a downsloping course until finally gaining positive climb. The report concluded that there had been a cumulative effect of three factors – erosion of take-off run available; delay in starting rotation; and a very slow rate of rotation – as a result of the flightdeck crew's miscalculation of the aircraft's takeoff weight (too high), a wrong pressure ratio for two of the aircraft's three engines (too low) and a sub-optimal choice of runway based on the use of outdated wind information that omitted the latest update's tailwind component.
29 March 1981: A Lockheed JetStar 1329 (registration: N267L) operating an inbound flight from Nigeria overran runway 08 and came to rest down the embankment beyond the eastern perimeter fence. The accident was caused because the pilot landed well past the touchdown zone in poor visibility at night. At the time runway 08 did not have an ILS. The co-pilot suffered severe spinal injuries but the commanding pilot and seven passengers escaped with only minor injuries.
15 January 1994: A Bell 206B JetRanger helicopter (registration: G-BODW) rolled over on takeoff. One of the rotor blades sliced into the cabin, killing the pilot. The aircraft was badly damaged and deemed a write-off.
18 July 2022: During the 2022 United Kingdom heat wave, and with air temperatures close to the runway melted and flights were forced to be diverted to Stansted, Bristol and other nearby airports. This led to severe delays for flights to and from the airport. The issue was rectified on the same day with flights resuming by the evening.
10 October 2023: At around 21:00, a large fire broke out in terminal car park 2, causing the partial collapse of the car park building. According to Bedfordshire Fire and Rescue Service, it was caused accidentally, by a diesel car fire that spread to other vehicles. Four firefighters and a member of airport staff were taken to hospital by the ambulance service. As a result of the fire, the airport suspended all flights until 15:00 the following day. It was reported that up to 1,500 cars in the car park were unsalvageable.

References

Notes

Citations

</references>

External links

London Luton Airport Limited
London Luton Airport Consultative Committee

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