Sky's the limit for Liverpool Airport's 75th anniversary

Apr 29 2008 by Peter Elson, Liverpool Daily Post

Even so, many readers will remember with affection travelling on, or spectating from the terminal balconies, the Dakotas, Viscounts and Britannias flown by Starways, British Eagle and Cambrian Airways.

However, at least in 1966, the authorities invested in the present main 7,500ft-long runway, which was opened on a new site to the south-east of the existing airfield. It enabled the airport to stay open for 24 hours a day and handle any aircraft.

Control of the airport transferred to Merseyside County Council from Liverpool Corporation in the mid-1970s and, 10 years later, to the five Merseyside councils following the abolition of Merseyside County Council. Later sold to British Aerospace, it in turn sold to current owners Peel Holdings.

The opening of the new modern passenger terminal, adjacent to the runway on the southern airfield site, in 1986, caused the closure of the original 1930s buildings.

“This was inevitable,” says Phil, “but has created the climate for the entrepreneurial development that is now thankfully driving the airport forward.”

For the public, the barometer of the airport’s real success is widely measured in terms of the London air link, a seemingly never-ending saga of more ups and downs in recent decades.

The Daily Post’s campaign to reinstate the link in 2003 resulted in VLM restarting services to the capital, which unfortunately were halted last year.

“This is not because of lack of demand for a Liverpool-London service, but because the hub VLM used was London City Airport,” says Phil.

“This was fine for business travellers, but no use for the vital leisure passenger market for whom being able to transfer to the widest variety of onward services is crucial.”

This is called inter-lining, the system by which travellers can change to international flights at the same airport without having to recheck themselves or their luggage in again.

“A pair of slots at London Heathrow recently changed hands for £30m, and no airline will buy those of for a service that will only show modest profit, such as one to Liverpool.

“The obvious answer is that Peel Holdings should buy the slots to ensure a London terminus, but by law they can’t, so it’s highly unlikely Liverpool will ever get its London air link back.

“Budget airlines have come to the rescue of Liverpool and this success in itself attracts other scheduled services. This may be a long, slow business, but I’m they’ll get there in the end and Liverpool will accumulate a wide array of services.

“Liverpool airport is a long-established enterprise that has gone through many ups and downs. For a long time, it felt like I was trying to support an underdog, but no longer.

“I believe that Peel has been the saving of the airport, and with it going from great strength to strength under its management we’ve every reason to celebrate the 75th anniversary.”

Phil has one final plea to readers. He says: “I’d like to find a photograph of the RAF’s 611 auxiliary squadron, with Spitfires lined up.

“There was a special parade for the Lord Mayor in June, 1939, in a Daily Post supplement, records of which were lost when the newspaper building was bombed in the Blitz of 1941.”

* LIVERPOOL John Lennon Airport, An Illustrated History, by Phil Butler, Tempus Books, £16.99

peter.elson@dailypost.co.uk

England’s most important building >>>