Why Edinburgh Airport was a breeze compared to nightmare Paris experience - Alastair Dalton

Among travel modes, aviation has had the most difficult recovery from a near shutdown during the Covid pandemic, chiefly because the speed of the passenger bounceback, with which the industry struggled to cope.

In Scotland, Edinburgh Airport, in particular, found itself a victim, such as from acute staff shortages among the baggage handling companies employed by airlines.

Over the past two years, it also became a repository for luggage arriving late because of transfer delays from hub airports such as Heathrow and Amsterdam.

So flying from Scotland’s busiest airport on holiday to France at the start of the school holidays last month gave me a useful perspective on both the state of the airport - and what it was like at the other end.

Despite the busyness of our Saturday departure day, the queue at the Ryanair bag drop off moved steadily and we were not kept waiting long.

Queuing to pass through security was also minimal - and the airport has a useful live indicator of wait times on its website which other airports should introduce.

I was also relieved to find enough space to sit in the departure lounge - both in the bar where we ate and near the boarding gate. My only irritation was the advertising plastered across several runway-facing windows, which I hadn’t noticed before.

There used to be a panoramic view from the departure area. The adverts both obscured that and reduced the amount of natural light coming in, which I think is vital to combat feelings of claustrophobia in confined, sealed spaces like airport terminals.

The airport defended the adverts as “using our infrastructure to promote products to passengers” - and compared them to those on scotsman.com.

However, while I had worried about how well Edinburgh would cope with an expected record of more than 15 million passengers this year, I should have been more concerned about the airport at the other end of our flight.

I had thought that Paris Beauvais, one of the French capital’s secondary airports, 50 miles north, would be smaller and quieter than using its main hub. But far from it.

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The airport has grown hugely since I last used it more than 20 years ago and now handles more than ten times as many passengers - 5.6m last year - which is also far more than before the pandemic.

Despite now having a second terminal, I was surprised to find it appeared to be bursting at the seams - and that was even before the French and English school holidays had started, let alone the Olympics.

There were confusing queues for different airlines in the check-in area that almost merged into another, for security, that tailed back from the opposite direction.

Everything seemed to be crammed in, with the security area jutting out into the departure lounge. It was not a relaxing experience.

The key here is the need for airports to provide enough space as passenger numbers return to a growth path.

While Edinburgh’s new majority French owners Vinci don’t operate Beauvais, they will be only too aware of the need to ensure sufficient passenger capacity at their new acquisition as the airport continues to attract more custom.