The world within reach of Valencia

The airport business has experienced a true revolution in the last few years, caused not only by the setting up of low- costairlines , but also because operators and airlines have started focusing their attention on new destinations . Untilvery recently only Madrid and Barcelon a airports haddaily flights to the main European cities or even other parts of the world. Today Manises airport in Valencia has become a first rate option as regards international flights. Valencia is now connected to the main European capitals such as Rome, Brussels, London or Berlin among others. To these must be added new commercial routes to other major European cities suchas Cologne, Milan or Zurich, to name but a few. This means that Valencia is currently as close to the main European business centres as if it was located in the same country. In terms of tourism this is extremely important, as the city has become one of the most popular destinations for forei gn tourists. And as regards business it has meant revolution . The combination of a super bvenue provided by the Valencia Conference Centre and the numerous flights now available to and from Manises airport implies an increasing number of international conferences and business conventions being held in Valencia.

According to the information supplied by AENA, Valencia airport passenger growth has been spectacular. The increase in 2004 was already 28,02% on the previous year with a total of 3,100,630 passengers. But provisional figures for October this year show anincrease of nearly 53%, since the number of passengers until October last year was 2,604,031, where as in 2005 the figure comes up to 3,976,908. This means that the total number of passengers in 2004 has already been amply exceeded and there are still two months to go, so the expectation is for 2003 figures to be doubled by this years final ones . Low – costairlines have played a part in this developmet , as the increase in the number of passengers has been 255% over two consecutive years.