2015 was a busy year for Heathrow Airport as a record number of passengers passed through the terminals.
Nearly 75 million passengers travelled through Heathrow in 2015, an increase of 2.2% on 2014 and the airport’s highest ever number of annual passengers.
Larger aircraft have reportedly led to the increase in annual passenger volumes, with seats per aircraft increasing 2.1% to 209 and passengers per aircraft rising by 1.9% to 160.
At the end of 2015, over 20 daily A380 departures and arrivals were operated by eight airlines.
Emerging markets were also thanked for the increase, with passenger volumes up 14% to China, 8% to Latin America and 6% to the Middle East.
Heathrow CEO John Holland-Kaye said: “2015 has been a banner year for Heathrow, serving more passengers than ever and being recognised in a number of awards as the best major airport in Europe for both passenger service and eco-innovation.
“The record levels of passenger satisfaction are due to a significant increase in training, apprenticeships and the number of front line colleagues moving into management roles.
Our new expansion plan will make Heathrow the most sustainable hub airport, and Britain the best connected country in the world.”
HACAN chair, John Stewart said: “This shows that, with building a controversial third runway , Heathrow can attract record numbers of passengers by using bigger planes.
“It has the terminal capacity to accommodate 90 million passengers a year.”
Last week, 2,000 black paper planes were planted outside Parliament in a protest against a third runway at Heathrow Airport.
