| AdminHistory | The City Council formed the Airport Committee in 1935, but the Birmingham Airport was not opened at Elmdon, Birmingham until the 8th July 1939, at a cost of £360,000, with the first scheduled flight to arrive was from Liverpool and operated by Dragon Rapide. The airport was owned and operated by the Birmingham City Council as a municipal airport and was designed to meet the needs of the residents and the industry of the city, as well as its immediate surroundings. Within a few months civil aviation had to be ceased due to the outbreak of the Second World War, as the airport was requisitioned by the Air Ministry, who built two new hard runways and two hangars on the eastern side from the construction of Stirling and Lancaster airplanes. The airport became the home of the RAF 51st Elementary Flight Training School (EFTS) for the duration of the war.
The airport finally re-opened for civil aviation in July, 1946, when services were operated to cities in Britain and Ireland, however, control of the airport was not returned to the Birmingham City Council, from the government, until 1960. The runways were extended in 1959 to allow larger aircraft and the first jet-engine Comet arrived in 1961, but they were still insufficient and in 1964 and 1966 they were extended again. In April 1974, control of the airport came under the newly formed West Midlands County Council, the county council incorporated the seven Metropolitan areas of Birmingham, Coventry, Dudley, Sandwell, Solihull, Walsall and Wolverhampton. The National Exhibition Centre had been constructed next to the airport and by 1978, the first Jumbo Jets (Qantas) were using the airport and in 1980, Concorde made its first visit.
As international flights became more available, the terminal and the runway were expanded again to cater for these growing needs and 1984 saw the opening of the Main Terminal, with a capacity for 3 million passengers. In 1986 after the West Midlands County Council was abolished, ownership of the Airport transferred to a newly formed West Midlands District Joint Airport Committee still comprising the seven district councils of the West Midlands administrative area. The Airports Act 1986 introduced legislation requiring municipal airports with a turnover in excess of £1 million to become Public Airport Companies and on 1st April 1987, the ownership of the Airport transferred to Birmingham International Airport plc, a public limited company owned by the seven West Midlands district councils.
July 1991 saw the opening of the Birmingham International Airport's second terminal - the Eurohub. A concept already developed in the United States for domestic operations, Eurohub took the 'hub and spoke' principle a stage further by solving the complications of customs and immigration control which previously demanded separate terminals. It was the first terminal in the world to combine domestic and international passengers. Thanks to the new terminal design, the greatest distance passengers have to walk to, from and between flights is only 250 metres, all within a target transfer time of just 25 minutes. |