THE boss of Southend Airport is calling on Easyjet to base another 20 planes as his rivals struggle for spare capacity.

Glynn Jones, chief executive of Stobart Air, which runs Southend Airport, said it is the only London base which will have any space left for expansion within the next three years.

The former director of Luton Airport has based his claims on data from the Department of Transport and the Civil Aviation Authority.

He said: “Capacity at all the other London airports runs out in three years.

“Gatwick is pretty much at full capacity and Luton will have capacity of 18million and will soon be full and Heathrow is full until their new runway is built.

“There is no capacity in the other airports, but we do have space.”

Southend Airport expects to welcome 1.2million passengers this year, and intends on doubling that to 2.5million next year.

Mr Jones added “Our infrastructure gives us capacity for about five million passengers a year and we have even more on the airfields.

“We are making big investments on airfields which would give us capacity for ten million, but that would be in the future and we would need planning permission.

“We have 36 runway movements an hour – that is as much as Luton currently has, but we still have a lot of capacity.”

£150million has been invested into the airport to date, which, according to Mr Jones, is less than Luton spent to increase capacity by six million.

And while they certainly have the capacity, Mr Jones has said that it is good transport links to the capital which will ensure future growth and make Southend the fifth London airport.

He said: “We have the right to be a London airport. We serve Essex really well but you would be amazed by how many people book with us from central London.

“Using public data, we looked at how long it would take passengers from Amsterdam to get to the London Stock exchange. Although it was fastest to fly into City Airport, Southend was the second fastest.

“We have six trains an hour and the station is less than 100 paces from the terminal. It takes 45 minutes to Stratford and with Crossrail next year, it will take 40 minutes.

“Our road access is also good, you can get to the city in 45 minutes.”

As for the future, there are 11 new routes with Flybe starting next week. The airport expects more EasyJet destinations to be unveiled this summer, and Mr Jones is in talks with other airlines.

Stobart is also hoping that as many as 20 aircraft are redeployed to Southend as result of London airports being at full capacity.

Mr Jones added: “It is very difficult to maintain customer satisfaction as you grow but if you make it part of what you do, you keep it.”