Dubai Airports has released its year-end traffic report which confirms that Dubai International has become the number one airport for international passenger numbers.
The airport has ended London Heathrow’s years of dominance as the world’s number one international hub, with its full year passenger numbers totalling 70,475,636 – a 6.1 percent rise from the previous year. A record 68.1 million international passengers used London’s Heathrow during the same period.
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Aircraft movements in December rose 4 percent to 34,136, while full year aircraft movements totalled 357,399 compared to 369,953 in 2013 – a slight decline primarily due to the temporary reduction of flights during the 80 day runway refurbishment.
Authorities have forecast that 79 million passengers will travel through Dubai International Airport in 2015.
“Much like 2014, 2015 promises to be another eventful year featuring more record passenger numbers and facility upgrades including the opening of Concourse D which will boost Dubai International’s capacity to 90 million,” said Paul Griffiths, CEO of Dubai Airports.
Dubai International Airport has been experiencing growth between 10 to 15 percent every year for the past decade, and improvements to service initiatives and technology as well as the new concourse will no doubt increase passenger numbers even further.
Sheikh Ahmed Bin Saeed Al Maktoum, Chairman of Dubai Airports said: “The shared goal is to make Dubai a global centre of aviation and we are nearing that goal thanks to an open skies policy, a friendly business environment, Dubai’s growing attractiveness as a centre for trade, commerce and tourism, growing network connectivity due to the rapid expansion of Emirates and flydubai and timely investment in aviation infrastructure.”
For 2014, the top market for growth in passenger volumes was Western Europe with an increase of well over a million passengers (+1,192,831), followed by the Indian Subcontinent with an increase of 936,449 passengers, Asia with an +716,180 passenger increase and North America with an +432,597 passenger increase.
Dubai is home to Emirates, which is the world’s biggest international carrier by traffic. Low-cost carrier FlyDubai is also based at the hub and has been rapidly expanding routes around the Middle East, Africa and Europe since it launched a little over five years ago.
In the chart, below, we highlight the dramatic capacity growth from Dubai International Airport over the past ten years. Departure capacity from the airport has risen from 16,799,851 seats in 2005 to 45,019,420 seats last year, an average annual increase of 18.7 per cent.
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