Renfrew Airport

Renfrew Airport was the former domestic airport serving the city of Glasgow until it was decommissioned in 1966.

It was located in the Newmains area of Renfrew, approximately 2 kilometres east of Abbotsinch Airfield which would eventually replace it. It consisted of a main terminal building and ancillary buildings, and a main runway which ran west south-west of the terminal.

Already in existence as a military facility during the First World War, it first handled scheduled flights in 1933 with the first regular destination being Campbeltown.

Despite the construction of a new terminal building in 1954 (with a parabola arch), it became evident that the airport was unable to cope with the increasing demands for domestic air travel in the 1960s. The final departure took place on 2 May 1966 - its destination being the new Glasgow Airport a few hundred metres away.

After the airport was closed, the area directly adjacent to the runway became the first urban part of the M8 motorway. Opened in March 1968, it connected the new Glasgow Airport to Bishopton in the west and Glasgow city centre (via Hillington) in the east. The entire airport was demolished in 1978. A Tesco supermarket and Arkleston Primary School was built on the former terminal site which opened for business in March 1980, and the whole of the surrounding area is now covered with housing.

The only trace of the airport left is the Flying Scotsman pub which was the Hertz car rental building. It is situated opposite where the main terminal sat.

In fiction

The airport features briefly in the second novel of a space opera series by Angus MacVicar, Return to the Lost Planet. One of the characters is about to fly back from Scotland to Berlin, but the hero and his companion join him at the last minute on the bus from St. Enoch, Glasgow, to the airport, and persuade him to stay and help them.

References

Notes

Bibliography

• McCloskey, Keith. Glasgow's Airports: Renfrew and Abbotsinch. Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK: The History Press Ltd., 2009. ISBN 978-0-7524-5077-3.
• Smith, David J. Action Stations, Volume 7: Military airfields of Scotland, the North-East and Northern Ireland. Cambridge, Cambridgeshire, UK: Patrick Stephens Ltd., 1983 ISBN 0-85059-563-0.

External links

• Brief history of Renfrew Airport