The newspaper ranked the 30 busiest airports in the British Isles yesterday, and placed Guernsey 21st overall. Jersey placed 10th. The local airport scored well for the 30 minutes free parking available and the ease of reaching it from other parts of the island.
The Telegraph, using CAA figures from 2024, stated that one in 20 flights were cancelled from Guernsey.
And reliability damaged the airport’s position in the rankings. Guernsey came 25th on punctuality, with 62% of flights on time – only beating Gatwick and three airports, which did not have available figures.
When it came to cancellations 5.1% of flights were cancelled, the worst of all the airports. The next worst was the Isle of Man with 3.9% of flights. The newspaper used 2024 CAA figures.
Looking at the CAA figures for the first five months of this year, 249 flights have been cancelled – around 3.6% of total flight movements. Last year more than 900 Guernsey flights were cancelled.
The newspaper examined a range of criteria, including destinations served, distance from a ‘city’ by road, drop-off and parking charges, quality of biggest airline, average Google review score and architectural aesthetics.
Liverpool John Lennon topped the poll with 888 points, and was praised for its fast security queues and punctuality of flights. It was followed by Belfast City and London City. Jersey came in 10th with 799 points, and recognition of its low cancellation rate.
Guernsey scored 688 points – the same as Bournemouth – to place 21st. That put it ahead of Bristol, Exeter and Leeds Bradford. Cardiff came last, with 591 points.
Looking at the individual metrics, Guernsey scored well for being easy to reach. It is 3.8 miles from the nearest city – presumably St Peter Port – with a journey time of 13 minutes, putting it at the top of that leader board. Jersey came in fourth, with the 5.2 miles from St Helier taking 18 minutes. It was also one of just four airports – along with Newquay, Inverness and Sumbrugh in Shetland – to offer any free parking time.
However, it came out as the joint seventh most expensive place to leave a car for a week, with a standard £108 parking charge. That was equal with Heathrow and more expensive than Gatwick, where it costs £98. The most expensive parking place was London City, where a week costs £143.
Guernsey was flagged as the 20th most connected airport, with 19 destinations across seven countries, edging it ahead of Southampton, which has 16 routes, but behind Jersey, with its 24 destinations.
One comfort for the airport is that it scored 4.0 on its Google rating, putting it close to most the airports in the top 10.
Guernsey Airport was contacted for comment.
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