LDY 29th UK Airport
As predicted City of Derry ended up as the 29th largest airport in the UK with 338,505 passengers in 2010, a drop of 2.1% on 2009 but not a bad result considering volcanic ash clouds and bad weather in January and December. Norwich was 28th with less passengers than LDY had at its peak in 2008. Humberside, Newquay, Blackpool and Durham were far behind.
At a 2.1% drop for the year, it looks like LDY has stablised and may even see an increase in passenger numbers in 2011 not withstanding the possible loss of Dublin and Alicante. In terms of percentage change LDY ranks at 18th best performing, with only Leeds, Belfast City, Liverpool and Doncaster showing any real growth (and of those, Belfast may not for 2011 following the loss of Ryanair).
Flights were down 8% so a 2% passenger decrease shows a loading increase which hopefully may see increased frequencies next year.
Still a long way to go though to the 1 million passengers by 2010 predicted some years ago by the council. (Though in 2008 prior to the credit crunch I recall it did look possible).