Enterprising Local Government

Abstract

The establishment of the first civil aviation airport at Manchester, England, in 1929, and its subsequent development, especially after World War II, owed much to the enterprise and vision of the local authority. Despite potential constraints on investment arising from municipal ownership, Ringway became an important regional center of civil air transport, and operated consistently on sound commercial principles. This article considers the ways in which the mode of ownership affected policy formulation and implementation up to the early 1980s, when the major post-war planning phase was completed. Three distinct, but interrelated, issues are concentrated upon: 1) identification of the crucial initiatives that underpinned airport development; 2) the ways in which conflicting interests within the authority were resolved, first during the early period of financial losses, and then later, when profits began to rise; and 3) the probing of key aspects of the evolving organizational structure in terms of the political economy of ownership, management, and control.