Portal:North West England/Selected article/10

Manchester Airport is a major airport in Manchester, England. It opened to airline traffic in June 1938. It was initially known as Ringway Airport and during World War Two, as RAF Ringway. From 1975 until 1986, the title Manchester International Airport was used. It is located on the boundary between Cheshire and Manchester in the metropolitan county of Greater Manchester.

It has two parallel runways, the second of which opened in 2001 at a cost of £172 million. The airport has three adjacent terminals and a railway station. It is owned by the Manchester Airports Group (MAG) which is controlled by the ten metropolitan borough councils of Greater Manchester and is the largest British-owned airport group.

Manchester Airport has a CAA Public Use Aerodrome Licence (Number P712) that allows flights for the public transport of passengers and for flying instruction.

Manchester Airport is the fourth busiest airport in the United Kingdom (after London Heathrow, London Gatwick and London Stansted). In total passengers handled, Manchester ranked 48th in the world in 2005, down from 45th in 2004. Also, in 2006 Manchester had a recorded 234,835 aircraft movements, of which 213,100 were air transport movements (third highest in the UK) behind Heathrow and just under Gatwick.

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