THE CIVIL AVIATION AUTHORITY (CAA) has published its latest survey of passengers conducted at five of the UK's major airports.
More than 200,000 passengers were interviewed during 2002 at Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted, Manchester and Luton airports.
The survey includes numerous travel indicators, such as why people fly, where they fly to, how they travelled to the airport and where they travelled from to get there.
It also covers demographic indicators such as passenger age, gender and income.
During 2002, of the 190.5m passengers travelling through all UK airports, 33.1% through Heathrow, followed by 15.5% at Gatwick, 9.8% at Manchester, 8.4% at Stansted and 3.4% at Luton.
Some of the key findings of the 2002 survey include that for passengers living outside the UK, visiting friends and relatives was the most popular reason for flying to or from any of the airports surveyed. Passengers working in the banking and finance sectors made up the majority of UK business passengers at Heathrow and Gatwick.
Most passengers travelled to the airports surveyed by private car. This figure was highest at Luton at 62.2%.
A summary report of the 2002 survey has been produced on a CD ROM. It is available for purchase from the CAA Survey Section.
http://www.caa.co.uk/caanews/caanews.asp?nid=769