London-Gatwick Airport has seen its planning application for a second runway approved by the UK Secretary of State for Transport, Heidi Alexander. It is currently Europe’s busiest single-runway airport, handling around 40 million passengers annually. With the increase in aircraft movements, London-Gatwick expects the airport’s capacity to double to around 80 million passengers per year. According to the airport, the new runway would be shorter than the existing main runway 28/06. Meanwhile, London-Stansted Airport has lodged a planning application to expand to handle 51 million passengers over the next 20 years.