Significant airport expansion in Dubai may take place despite the emirate’s financial problems, state-owned airport operating group Dubai Airports intimated on January 31st 2010. Dubai Airports’ future plans involve both enlarging capacity at the existing Dubai International Airport – already one of the world’s busiest in passenger handling terms – and constructing a brand new site – Al Maktoum International Airport - to complement it, too.

Nearly 41 million passengers passed through Dubai International Airport in 2009: a statistic that made it the 17th busiest airport on earth, and represented an increase of more than nine per cent over 2008. A huge 13.6 per cent increase is anticipated this year, taking passenger levels to 46 million.

Looking further ahead, it is possible that 2012 will see 60 million passengers using it.

Airport Expansion: Dubai

Speaking yesterday, Paul Griffiths, Dubai Airports’ Chief Executive Officer, stressed the significance of aviation within the economy at large - with the industry providing about a 25 per cent market share – and commented on Dubai’s airport expansion plans. “Dubai’s vision, attitude towards airport infrastructure is that if you constrain, the growth will go elsewhere” he explained, adding: “So we are not going to constrain that growth.”

Dubai International Airport aside, only a small number of international airports achieved passenger handling increases last year. These – Airports Council International has said – included Istanbul (6.3 per cent increase) and Kuala Lumpur (4.6 per cent).

“Dubai Airports is setting the pace globally”, Dubai Airports chairman Sheikh Ahmed Bin Saeed Al Maktoum stated in recent comments. “Dubai International's performance as one of the world's fastest growing airports in 2009 is particularly impressive considering the traffic contraction seen globally.”

Al Maktoum International Airport: Dubai

Close-by, construction is continuing on Al Maktoum International Airport – one component of the immense Dubai World Central integrated transport and logistics venture. It is planned that Al Maktoum will be the largest airport on the planet, and that passenger levels there will hit 120 million per annum.

One feature of Al Maktoum International Airport will be a whole series of parallel runways, which will allow four airliners to land at once. Current scheduling sees this vast new airport opening for business in around 2017.