{"id":3346,"date":"2026-06-08T10:43:49","date_gmt":"2026-06-08T08:43:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.oatridge.co.uk\/nic\/?p=3346"},"modified":"2026-06-08T11:08:44","modified_gmt":"2026-06-08T09:08:44","slug":"luton-airport-and-the-m1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.oatridge.co.uk\/nic\/history\/luton-airport-and-the-m1\/","title":{"rendered":"Flying to the Alps"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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The first package winter holiday by air was organised by Sir Henry Lunn in 1931. Through the 30s regular flights were flown by Swissair and Imperial from what was then the London Airport, in Croydon, to Zurich, but the flights were relatively expensive and most skiers took the train.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With the surplus of planes and pilots at the end of the Second World War and the emergence of a growing middle class, air travel for skiers became increasingly accessible in the 1950s. The 1960s saw companies such as Inghams and Erna Low transition from using trains to using planes for their ski packages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although Heathrow was established and regional airports became increasingly popular, the main hub for budget skiers taking to the skies was Luton Airport. And key to the success of Luton Airport was the building of the M1 in 1959, and the first concrete runway at the airport in 1960.
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By 1970, 53% of British households owned a car, and tour operators used the convenience of driving to Luton via the M1 as a major selling point, often highlighting cheap airport parking.
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Euravia (which later became Britannia Airways), the airline for Thomson\u2019s Sky Tours brand, specifically chose Luton as its base in the early 1960s due to its long runway, low airport charges and proximity to the M1.
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By 1970, Luton and Gatwick handled over half of all British charter flight movements.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With the increasing glamour associated with skiing after the emergence of the FIS World Cup circuit in 1967 and the televising of “Ski Sunday” in 1978, ski holiday numbers mushroomed. From perhaps no more than 20,000 British skiers travelling to the Alps in the 1950s, more than a million took to the slopes by the end of the 1970s, the vast majority taking package holiday flights to get to the Alps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1995 <\/strong>Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou launched the Easyjet brand, with the airline initially flying only out of Luton Airport. It has been headquartered there ever since.
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<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The first package winter holiday by air was organised by Sir Henry Lunn in 1931. Through the 30s regular flights were flown by Swissair and Imperial from what was then the London Airport, in Croydon, to Zurich, but the flights were relatively expensive and most skiers took the train. With the surplus of planes and … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Flying to the Alps”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[442],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3346","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-history"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.oatridge.co.uk\/nic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3346","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.oatridge.co.uk\/nic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.oatridge.co.uk\/nic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.oatridge.co.uk\/nic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.oatridge.co.uk\/nic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3346"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.oatridge.co.uk\/nic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3346\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3350,"href":"http:\/\/www.oatridge.co.uk\/nic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3346\/revisions\/3350"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.oatridge.co.uk\/nic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3346"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.oatridge.co.uk\/nic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3346"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.oatridge.co.uk\/nic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3346"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}