London City, which is currently the capital’s fifth airport, sees 4.5 million passengers a year, and will reach its seven million capacity by 2021, according to Glynn Jones, chief executive of Stobart Air, which is responsible for  development and operations of London Southend Airport.

He added that Gatwick which has a capacity of 45 million is already at nearly 44 million, and so would be full next year, while Luton is undergoing a large reconstruction to reach its limit up to 18 million. It currently has 14.5 million annual passengers now, and so will be full by 2019.

Meanwhile he said although Stansted has a capacity of 35 million and is only at 24 million all its spare capacity is off-peak, and Heathrow is full with its third runway unlikely to be completed until 2030.

“The projections say all London’s airports will be full by 2021, except Southend,” Jones told The Times. “We have planning capacity for five million passengers a year, but with the capacity for 36 movements an hour we could easily get to ten million. We will do 1.1 million in 2017 and have said we will do 2.5 million in our financial year to March 2019. The nine million extra capacity here is the big opportunity. It is the strategic opportunity for London.

“We are a London airport, but we haven’t yet got that through to the customer,” he added. “We have a shorter journey from the plane to the City of London than Luton or Stansted and, depending on the trains, Gatwick. We are five minutes from the plane here to our own train station, 15 minutes if you have baggage in the hold, and there are six trains an hour to Liverpool Street.”

EasyJet currently operates three aircraft out of the airport, which Jones suggests is just the start. He argued that train connections would continue to improve, especially once it is linked to Crossrail in a few years time, and that the carrier could subsequently look to pull out of the Ryanair-dominated Stansted and perhaps redeploy as many as 20 aircraft at Southend.

“The airlines have got some strategic decisions to make,” he said, “but for us we believe when the dam bursts, it bursts.”

What do you think? Should Southend be expanded to help alleviate the capacity squeeze facing London airports, or do you have a better solution? Let us know your thoughts below