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ew data has been released by the Airports Council International giving us a new list of the world's busiest airports. The biggest change on this year's list is the rapid growth of Asian airports. Beijing Capital International Airport jumped from 8th place in 2008 to second place in 2010. Beijing's airport has seen a more than 50% increase in passenger traffic since 2006, when the number of passengers was 48 million (in 2010 the total passenger count was nearly 74 million). Beijing Capital International Airport is poised to overtake Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport within a few years.
Additionally, we see three new airports that have made the top 20 list - all three are in Asia: Soekarno-Hatta International Airport (Jakarta, Indonesia - saw a 19.4% increase in passenger traffic in one year), Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport (China - 10.6% increase in one year), and Shanghai Pudong International Airport (China - an increase of 26.4% in one year). Several Asian airports that were already on the list saw phenomenal increases in passenger traffic from 2009 to 2010. Hong Kong saw an increase in 10.5%, Dubai saw a 15.4% increase, and Singapore experience a 13.0% increase in passenger traffic.
Simultaneously, three American airports have dropped from the top 20: McCarran International Airport (Las Vegas), George Bush Intercontinental Airport (Houston), and Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport. While American airports aren't seeing a significant decrease in passenger traffic (Las Vegas was the worst with a mere 1.8% drop in passengers over the previous year), there is not the explosive growth that Asia is seeing.
What are your thoughts about this dramatic growth of passenger traffic at Asian airports? Share your thoughts in the comments below...
(Image: Beijing Capital International Airport is now the world's second busiest. Getty Images.)
Comments
As recently as 2002, travel within Asia was prohibitively expensive even for an European. Introduction of newer planes and budget airlines has seen a mushrooming of travel (the best example being Air Asia). IndiGo a Budget airline from India just announced the purchase of 20 new planes. As the economies improved in China and India more and more people took to the skies. It is good to remember that their populations are more than three times the population of USA, so even a small increase in the number of people flying, made easier by newer airports and newer planes and newer airlines, the traffic increases. Currently it is so easy to fly within Asia and airports like Changi in Singapore are more like a city onto itself
Another busiest port in the world – Shanghai is also in China seems to be improved further.