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Kansas City airport has bumper passenger year as cargo declines

KANSAS CITY International Airport has its third busiest year in history in passenger volume, but air cargo traffic declined in 2017, said the city's aviation department.

"This past year brought air new carriers, new nonstop destinations and competitive air fares. Kansas City-area flyers responded by travelling more than at any point since 2001," said Kansas City, Missouri, director of aviation Pat Klein.

Air cargo was down 3.2 per cent in December with a total of 19.6 million pounds handled. For the year, 207.6 million pounds were handled, down 1.3 per cent, reported Wisconsin's Aviation Pros.

Air freight handled at KCI during December amounted to 18.8 million pounds, which represents a year-on-year decrease of 3.7 per cent.

For 2017, air freight was down 2.6 per cent with a total of 198.5 million pounds handled.

But air mail for December was up 10.3 per cent from December 2016 with 779,506 pounds handled. Air mail was up 39 per cent for the year with 9.2 million pounds handled.

The department also reported that 11,503,936 passengers travelled through the airport in 2017, up 4.2 per cent from 2016.

December totals were up 1.9 per cent year on year with 914,509 passengers arriving and departing.