Gold Coast Airport

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

You have new messages (last change).
Gold Coast Airport
IATA: OOL - ICAO: YBCG
Summary
Operator Queensland Airports Corporation
Serves Gold Coast, Queensland
Elevation AMSL 21 ft (6 m)
Coordinates 28°09′52″S, 153°30′17″E
Runways
Direction Length Surface
ft m
14/32 6,699 2,042 Asphalt
17/35 1,909 582 Asphalt

Gold Coast Airport, or Coolangatta Airport, (IATA: OOL, ICAO: YBCG) is an Australian domestic and international airport on the Gold Coast and is located some 80 kilometres (50 mi.) south of Brisbane. The entrance to the airport is situated in the suburb of Bilinga on the Gold Coast. The runway itself straddles 5 suburbs of twin cities across the state border of Queensland and New South Wales. During summer these states are in two different time zones.

Gold Coast Airport is the fastest growing airport in Australia, and has handled during financial year 2005/2006 3,581,646 passengers, 11,51% more than in the previous year. While 2006/2007 isn't yet finished, 2,259,181 passengers have already passed through the airport during the first seven months, with 352,554 visitors in January, which represents an all-time high of passengers handled in a single month by Coolangatta Airport.

Contents

[edit] History

Until 1999, the airport was known as Coolangatta Airport, meaning in Aboriginal language: "The place of good view". It originally consisted (1936) of three grass strips with the intention of only providing emergency landing ground for airmail aircraft transiting between Brisbane and Sydney. Finally, passenger flights took off for the first time in 1939, using the then grassy field of the current Coolangatta site.

Regular services were started by Queensland Airlines and Better Air Tranport after the Second World War. Ansett started its own services in 1950 using DC-3s, while Trans Australia Airlines did the same in 1954 using DC-3s too as well as DC-4s and Convairs to link other Australian cities.

By 1958, the taxiways and runways were fully-paved, with the later being upgraded a decade later to allow jet opertations with DC-9 and L-188 Electra aircraft to began. The current terminal, entitled Eric Robinson Building, was officially opened in 1981 by Acting Prime Minister Douglas Anthony, when at the time more than 650,000 passengers were using the airport.

The following year, the main runway was lengthened to its current figure, thus permitting the use of wide-body jets by the two domestic operators Ansett Airlines and Trans Australia Airlines and their Boeing 767 and Airbus A300 respectively on flights from Melbourne and Sydney.

In 1990, the airport welcomed its first international charter service from New Zealand, and by 1998, Air New Zealand low-cost subsidiary Freedom Air started scheduled no-frills service from Hamilton, New Zealand with Boeing 737s.

On January 1, 1988, the airport ownership was transferred from the government to the Federal Airport Corporation. Its full privatisation occurred a decade later, when it was taken over by QAL - Queensland Airport Limited on May 29, 1998. By 1999, the company's name had changed to become GCAL - Gold Coast Airport Limited.[1] Despite the name change, Gold Coast Airport still carries IATA Airport Code, OOL.

[edit] Infrastructures

It is anticipated that a railway station will be constructed at the airport when the Gold Coast Line is extended.

The airport is building an extension to the main runway as well as a full length parallel taxiway which are expected to be opened by April 2007. Once the work is completed, the runway will be 2500m/8200ft long, allowing for heavier aircraft with greater range to take off. [2]

Duty free shopping is available at this airport also.

[edit] Airlines and Destinations

Eric Robinson terminal from inside an Airbus A320
Eric Robinson terminal from inside an Airbus A320

[edit] References

  1. ^ Gold Coast Airport website - history
  2. ^ Finelli, Marco: Coolangatta Gold Coast - An airport with a golden future, page 55, (Airliner World online) September 2005
  • Coolangatta Gold Coast - An airport with a golden future by Marco Finelli - Airliner World September 2005. (Airliner World online)

[edit] External link

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org../../../g/o/l/Gold_Coast_Airport_3649.html"
In other languages