Passenger Numbers for Malaga Airport Take Off

Passenger Numbers for Malaga Airport Take Off 

Malaga Airport continues to break all passenger records

If you were to take facets of Spanish life and turn it into a graph, almost all of those lines would be sharply pointed upwards. Whether it’s the economy, house prices, jobs, or life expectancy – things are going well for Spain and her people. Now tourism can be thrown into this cocktail as this year is set to be the very best year for visitor numbers in Spain; spending, overnight stays, and the number of flights to and from the country are all up

The most popular tourist destinations are the ones leading the charge; the Balearics, the Canaries, the Costa Brava, and the Costa del Sol. While the passenger data from Malaga Airport in 2017 isn’t complete just yet, the stats for 2016 – recently published by the EU statistics agency Eurostat have proven to be encouraging. 

The data shows that there has been a 15.7$ increase in passenger numbers to Malaga airport in 2016 over 2015, making the Costa del Sol hub the second-fastest growing airport across all of Europe; falling just behind London-Luton. 

Around 16.6 million passengers in all passed through the Malaga airport across last year, a figure that is almost definitely going to be surpassed by the end of 2017. 

The figures from the El Prat airport in Barcelona have been even more impressive, bring in in 43.7 million passengers last year for an annual increase of 11%. Some locals might not be too happy about this though given that there have been campaigns in the city to limit tourism. 

All in all, Spanish airports proved to be the third-busiest in Europe in 2016, dealing with 194 million passengers. Germany proved to be second-busiest, with 201 million passengers (hardly surprising when you consider Germany has the biggest population in Europe), while the UK had the busiest airports welcoming 249 million passengers in 2016. This is a combination of Britain being such a strong tourist destination, as well as the collective desire of Brits to get away from the country and enjoy warmer climates elsewhere.