An exploratory examination of additional ground access trips generated by airport ‘meeter-greeters’

•The scale of ground access travel by airport meeter-greeters is significant, especially at large airports.•Meeter-greeter trips remain largely unreported, which has important implications for future strategic planning decisions.•Multi-person trips with 3 or more ‘meeter-greeters’ have a disproportionate impact on trip generation.•A passenger's journey purpose and resident status are important factors in determining meeter-greeter trip generation.•Ground access metrics should incorporate measures of meeter-greeter trips in addition to typical mode share indicators.

A significant share of airport passengers are accompanied to and/or from the airport by friends and relatives to wave them off or greet them when they land. At some airports the number of these ‘meeter-greeters’ can be substantial, which can have important ground access planning, economic and environmental implications for the airport operator. Yet this group have received comparatively little attention in either the academic or industry literature. Consequently, to some extent ‘meeter-greeters’ have remained something of a ‘hidden’ element of ground access user. In an attempt to address this, the paper uses secondary data analysis of the UK CAA Passenger Survey Report to explore ‘meeter-greeters’ at five UK airports; Heathrow, Gatwick, Manchester, Stansted and Luton. Focus is given to assessing the scale of ‘meeter-greeter’ journeys and the role of a passenger's trip purpose (business/leisure) and resident status (resident/non-resident) in this process. A key finding from the analysis relates to the disproportionate impact of multi-person trips, where a number of different ‘meeter-greeters’ accompany a passenger to the airport. The implications of these findings are discussed and a number of recommendations for decision makers proposed. Namely, it is suggested that airport monitoring and assessment procedures should incorporate a measure of the additional trip generation by ‘meeter-greeters’ in order to present a more complete picture of the number of people accessing/egressing an airport.