| Melbourne
Airport (also known as Tullamarine Airport) (IATA: MEL,
ICAO: YMML) is to the north of the city, adjacent to the
suburb of Tullamarine, Victoria, Australia. The airport
has its own suburb boundaries with the area officially
named Melbourne Airport and the postcode 3045.
The Melbourne suburb of Tullamarine,
Victoria, Australia, is a collection of recent housing
estates and light industry. It is located in the City
of Hume.
Genearlly flat and exposed to the hot
northerly winds of Melbourne's summer, its most notable
feature is the nearby Melbourne Airport. Tullamarine's
residential area is contained in a circular loop of the
Moonee Ponds Creek, and its western boundary is the Melbourne
Airport, originally called the Tullamarine Airport. Tullamarine
contains the smaller residential area of Gladstone Park.
The Melbourne to Sydney railway line
separates Tullamarine from Airport West to the south.
Melbourne Airport has four terminals.
The international terminal (T2) has 16 gates (gates 12-16
are 'standoff' (or non-airbridge) gates). The three domestic
terminals, T1 used exclusively by Qantas and its Jetstar
subsidiary; the multi-user T3 primarily used by Virgin
Blue; and the low-cost T4 which will be used by Tiger
Airways Australia, have 46 gates between them. In the
2006-07 financial year over 22 million passengers used
the airport.
Melbourne Airport passenger numbers
have hit a record high, with the airport recording more
than 20 million passengers in 2005. However recently numbers
have been declining as a result of airlines leaving and
existing airlines cutting capacity. Melbourne international
passenger numbers were down 2% in the final quarter of
2006. Despite this, overall figures for the year until
June 2007 showed that numbers improved, the airport receiving
22.5 million passengers, 4.5 million of those arriving
from overseas.[2] Furthermore Hong Kong's Cathay Pacific
Airways announced an additional daily service to Melbourne,
now three times daily, whilst Norfolk Island's Norfolk
Air has announced a once-weekly Norfolk Island - Sydney
- Melbourne - Norfolk Island service, to commence in October.
There were 180,500 aircraft movements, the vast majority
(151,200) being domestic passenger services. Melbourne
Airport is currently the second busiest airport in Australia
after Kingsford Smith Airport in Sydney however is expected
to be overtaken by Brisbane Airport in the future in terms
of annual passenger numbers.[citation needed] The airport
is curfew-free and operates 24 hours a day, although in
practice there are few aircraft movements between midnight
and 4 a.m, except freight aircraft.
The existing Skybus service was improved
to compensate and remains the only available public transport
service to the airport direct from the Melbourne CBD,
the trip taking approximately 20 minutes from Southern
Cross Station. A local daily bus service run by Tullamarine
Bus Lines operates Route 478 between Moonee Ponds Junction
and Melbourne Airport.
Information coutesy of Wikipedia
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