Hotels in Gatwick this is your Accommodation guide. |
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Welcome to Book Hotels in Gatwick
Gatwick Airport is London's second largest airport and the second busiest airport in the UK after Heathrow. It is also the busiest single runway airport, and 22nd busiest airport (7th in terms of international passengers) in the world in terms of passengers per year. It is located in Crawley, West Sussex (originally Charlwood, Surrey) 2.7 nm (5 km or 3 miles) north of the town centre, and 24.7 nm (46 km or 28 miles) south of London, and 40 km north of Brighton.
With about 200 destinations the airport handled over 34 million passengers with 263,363 aircraft movements in 2006. Charter airlines are generally not allowed to operate from Heathrow and many use Gatwick instead as their base. Many flights to and from the USA also use Gatwick because of restrictions on transatlantic operations from Heathrow. The airport is a secondary hub for British Airways and Virgin Atlantic.
In 1979, when the last major expansion took place, an agreement was reached with the local council not to expand further before 2019, but recent proposals to build a second runway suitable for large jets at Gatwick led to protests about increased noise and pollution and demolition of houses and villages. The government has now decided to expand Stansted and Heathrow but not Gatwick. Gatwick's owners BAA have published a new consultation which includes a possible second runway south of the airport, but leaves the villages of Charlwood and Hookwood intact, north of the airport.
Like many other airports, car parking is in limited supply at Gatwick. This is partly due to local planning restrictions. Facilities are often full to capacity in the summer months.
