Why are airports important?

An airport is the point where the air network touches the ground. Without one, a region is cut off from a system that moves billions of passengers every year and carries a large share of world trade by value, even if only a tiny fraction by weight: pharmaceuticals, electronic components, flowers or fresh fish travel in the cargo hold because their shelf life or price cannot afford weeks at sea. The distance to an airport with frequent flights weighs heavily in deciding where to locate a factory, a headquarters or a logistics hub.

Tens of thousands of people work around a major airport: airlines, ground handling, maintenance, controllers, security, shops, hotels and ground transport. Bodies such as ATAG and ACI estimate that air transport sustains tens of millions of jobs worldwide, counting direct, indirect and induced employment, and that much of that activity is generated on the airport site itself. Many cities are planned around their airport, with industrial parks, trade fairs and business parks settling within its radius of influence.

An airport is also a border: passports, goods and health checks are carried out there, and its tower and radar organize traffic across the whole area. On islands and in remote territories it is often the only fast route for medical emergencies, mail and supplies, which is why many states keep loss-making airports open under public-service obligations. Its importance is most obvious when it shuts down: a strike, a snowfall or a volcanic eruption is enough to paralyze an entire region's economy.