Bristol Airport History

Bristol Airport History

Bristol Airport was made possible by a group of business men, who raised £6,000 to start a new venture, this was a flying club at Filton Aerodrome, this was in 1927 and it became the birthplace of Concorde. These business men attracted so much interest in their venture, they decided to develop Bristol Airport. An old area of farmland at Whitchurch was bought, and that's where the new Airport began.
Bristol Airport was officially opened in 1930 by HRH Prince George. At this time Bristol Airport was only the third civil airport in the country.

From 1930 - 1939
Whitchurch slowly developed with passenger numbers only being 935 this was in 1930, but by 1939 this had increased to 4,000 passengers.
Like all the other Airports the outbreak of War saw the Airport requisitioned by the Air Ministry.

Imperial Airways, KLM and others were transferred from London's Croydon Airport to Whitchurch. The Airport was inverse so flights to Lisbon
& the Unites States of America took off from Whitchurch. The comings and goings of Statesmen, Spies film stars and others were shrouded in secrecy. There were also the then prime minister Winston Churchill and Amy Johnson who used the airport during the war period.

Following the war many discussions took place on the fate and future of Whitchurch, with the general view that Whitchurch could not be
developed for post War use and its future was limited. In 1955 Bristol Airport won its ten year battle for a new City airport, Lulsgate Bottom which had been used as an airfield by the R.A.F for ten years was bought for £55,000 by Bristol Corporation and its official name was
"Bristol Lusgate Airport"

After the War period it was revealed that Whitchurch's development was limited as there was no possible way of extending the runway.
Bristol Airport was de - requisitioned in 1956 and the airport committee decided to purchase and develop Lulsgate bottom airfield.
By now Lusgate bottom was a disused R.A.F airfield, which had been developed and used as a fighter command base during War years.

The Duchess of kent, whose late husband had been killed during the war, was asked for a second time to open the new airport, and in the
first year of service the new airport proved an instant success with throughput of 33,000 passengers and 608,000 kilos of freight.

Eventually in 1963 - 1965 Bristol airports runway was lengthened and the terminal building extended. In 1968 a new 5,000 square foot transit
shed was constructed, which meant many freight agents eager to use the airport regularly..

Ten years later 1973 saw the collapse of court line, which had a dramatic effect on air passenger numbers, this affected all UK airports.
Within years the airport crawled back with seventeen tour operators offering flights from the West Country. In 1985 a £13 million development program was completed to accommodate increasing passengers and provide state of the art systems for Bristol Airports increasing
growth of traffic.

1984 improvements were made in all aspects of Bristol airport, the fire fighting vehicles were upgraded, and within the terminal building
caterleisure had been awarded the catering contract, with self service buffet, restaurant, landside bar, shops and and an airside bar.
The airport authority added a new departure lounge, and duty free shops. Complete refurbishment of the departure concourse, including
new check in desks and scales, conveyor belts for luggage, new tour operators desks, and flight information screens.
Facilities for the disabled, with car parking spaces in the car parks, also additional wheelchairs and landside airside toilets.

On the 1st April 1987 all employee's of Bristol City Council all joined Bristol airport plc. The operation and net assets of the airport were then transferred from the City of Bristol and the company started trading. By 1998 Bristol airports growth saw its 100,000 passenger through its airport terminal for the first time ever.

1989 Record passenger numbers passed through Bristol airport terminal, with a 31% increase 34,345 passengers used Bristol airport.
Air lingus decided to fly from Bristol to Dublin, and Lufthansa's service to Dusseldorf took off from Bristol, there was also Netherline's NLM airline using the airport to fly to Amsterdam. But the largest schedule service airline to use Bristol was Jersey European airways.
Further development to Bristol airport continued, adding a children's play area and extensive refurbishment to the main bar area.
To improve the facilities at Bristol airport a shuttle service operated from the airport car parks to the main airport terminal building.
In the same year a £4.3 million project to resurface the airport runway & taxiway was undertaken. Then in November Brymon Airways started operating from Bristol airport three times daily to Glasgow. Brymon Airways continue to dominate the expansion programme with the introduction of an additional service to Edinburgh. Freight traffic also increased with scheduled services booming and the Post Office illustrated its commitment by opening up a new sorting office at Bristol airport.

Then during the 1990s the recession caused a major setback resulting in the demise of Airlines, tour operators, airlines and travel agents,which left a negative affect on Bristol Airport. Those that survived the recession experienced reduced profits with some recording losses for the first time. Bristol airport did not remain unscathed, managing to record similar passenger numbers to the previous year although profits did reduce.

1992 - 1993
Increase in turnover and a £1.95 million increase in profits, and also a million passengers through the airport meant that Bristol airport had achieved what it set out to do. 1993 - 1994 The success of Bristol airport increased with growing numbers of passengers, this increased profits and created new jobs for Bristol community. Also Air Lingus and Brymon Airways decided to fly to new destinations, benefiting Bristol airport's turnover.

Bristol Airport's freight facility, was relocated to a site in Avonmouth. The new facility situated close to the M4 - M5 interchange was ideally located to take advantage of the increasing amount of freight travelling to the South West from Heathrow by road. In May 1994 the application for a proposed new airport terminal building was approved by the Secretary of State.

Bristol Airport was put up for sale by Bristol City Council. The way, in which the council could obtain funding meant that the airport could not start building, it's much needed new terminal. With passenger figures increasing and the terminal building starting to exceed it's capacity something needed doing. March 97 saw the naming of Bristol Airport to Bristol International Airport as we all know it today. This move reinstated the airport's plans for growth. December 97 the airport was sold. 51% was owned by FirstGroup, the remaining 49% still belonged to Bristol City Council.

1998 - 1999
Extensive changes were made at Bristol Airport; the old terminal was refurbished and modernized to make it see out the next few years. The airport was still expanding rapidly and growth in passenger numbers increased through the airport terminal; the next year was scheduled to carry 2 million passengers. FirstGroup invested £32 million in the development of Bristol International airport and the autumn saw the start of the long awaited new £27 million airport terminal building that was designed to carry 3.5 million airport passengers. This building will see Bristol International airport into the millennium and beyond.

March 3rd 2000 the New Airport Terminal was opened by HRH the Princess Royal, and flights started leaving the new building on the 7th March. The old Bristol airport terminal building closed to the public and was converted to offices for many of the staff. Brymon airways introduced two new routes to Frankfurt and Munich, passenger numbers continued to grow. 2000 also saw it's first direct transatlantic flight in many years operating to Toronto by Royal Airlines. The success story of Bristol International Airport had arrived and is set to continue.

Bristol International Airport was officially the fastest growing airport in the UK, with a year on year passenger increase. Four new services were launched in 2002, Go started services to Prague, Aer Arran started a new service to Cork, in October Air France started services to Paris and Go started services to Venice. In May the Airport celebrated the 1st anniversary of the arrival of Go, over 750,000 people used the Go services in the first year of operation.

June saw the opening of the new £800,000 domestic baggage reclaim hall, with two baggage belts and a new baggage carousel. In August Bristol International Airport celebrated handling 3 million passengers in a 12-month period for the first time, a landmark for Bristol Airport.

The Airport achieved another landmark in November 2002, when it was awarded the covered Investors in People standard for the Airports commitment to staff training and development. The new £800,000 covered walkway, which provides weatherproof cover to six aircraft stands opened to the public in December.

Still today Bristol International Airport is thriving and continuing to grow annually with passenger numbers exceeding 3.8 million passengers. Destinations are increasing with the most popular scheduled International flights being Dublin, Alicante, Malaga, Amsterdam and Paris.
The most popular three holiday destinations in 2003 were Tenerife, Palma and Alicante.