LJLA wins prestigious UK Airport of the Year award

Liverpool John Lennon Airport (LJLA) last night achieved the accolade of ‘UK Airport of the Year’ for the first time, at the prestigious annual Travel Trade Gazette (TTG) awards night. Over 1,300 guests gathered at Old Billingsgate in London to celebrate the achievements of the best suppliers in the travel industry, hosted by TV comedian Rob Brydon.

LJLA fought of stiff competition to win the ‘UK Airport of the Year Award 2007′ having been short listed against Manchester, Birmingham, East Midlands, London Luton and Bristol Airports.

The Airports went through a rigorous judging process before LJLA was announced as the winner. TTG is the UK’s largest-circulation weekly newspaper for the travel trade and travel agents were asked to vote for their best UK airport. Those who survived the agents’ verdict were short-listed and six finalists went before a panel of experts who met secretly in London to pick the winners.

TTG invited 37 industry experts to pick the eventual winners in each category including leading figures in the industry from organisations such as the Federation of Tour Operators, Global Travel Group and ABTA. In the Airport category, their decisions were based upon their experience of the finalists’ as well considering aspects of each Airport’s business, including passenger and airline growth, improvements to public transport access, environmental initiatives and work with the local community.

Although short listed in previous years, this is the first time that LJLA has been chosen as the UK’s best airport and is tremendous recognition of all the hard work and determination of staff at LJLA in recent years.

Neil Pakey, LJLA’s Managing Director commented, “To win the industry’s most prestigious Airport Award is a recognition of both Peel’s belief in turning the Airport into a real regional gateway and to the employees and businesses who work here to turn the investment into a real experience. This gives us confidence to keep pressing ahead and be at the forefront of the North West’s regeneration programme.”