Edinburgh Airport yesterday established itself as Scotland's biggest after breaking the nine million passengers a year barrier for the first time.

Edinburgh Airport yesterday established itself as Scotland's biggest after breaking the nine million passengers a year barrier for the first time.

The capital's hub, a modest domestic feeder airport as little as five years ago, handled 9,017,491 people in the 12 months until November.

Edinburgh's numbers have soared in recent years thanks to a range of new business and holiday services, many kick-started by Scottish Government subsidies.

Its main rival, Glasgow International, has struggled to grow quite so quickly thanks to stiff competition from low-cost base Glasgow Prestwick and poorer surface access to central Scotland, something its owners hope will change after the completion of the M74 motorway across the south side of Glasgow.

Glasgow, which like Edinburgh is owned by BAA Scotland, actually saw passenger numbers dip in November despite massive rises in major and lucrative long-haul routes such as Dubai in the Middle East and New York.

The west of Scotland airport, which remains Scotland's biggest international gateway, handled 8.8 million passengers in the past 12 months. The main reason for the decline has been a drop in Glasgow's traditional bucket-and-spade charter market.

Donald Morrison, BAA Scotland's spokesman, said: "We've always known Edinburgh would overtake Glasgow at some point. For us, the main concern is the charter market, which is in decline across the UK. There is a lot of consolidation with the big four - Thomson, Thomas Cook, MyTravel and First Choice - becoming the big two. There is going to be a period of about six months when there will be no growth from Scotland."

Much of the old charter traffic is being replaced by scheduled low-cost services, with easyJet renewing its long-lost interest in Scotland. It is now competing with Scots-based flyglobespan, Ireland's Ryanair and other operators on sunshine routes out of Glasgow, Edinburgh and Prestwick, luring holidaymakers away from less flexible package holidays.

Stephen Baxter, BAA Scotland's outgoing chairman and a former managing director of Glasgow Airport, remained upbeat yesterday.

"We can reflect on what has been a remarkably successful year for our airports, with record passenger numbers, an expanding route network and a massive capital investment plan transforming the experience for today's and tomorrow's passenger," he said. "As a result of BAA's investment, Scotland's airports are in good shape for the year ahead."

Overall international traffic from Scottish airports has soared in recent years. The three airports owned by BAA - Edinburgh, Glasgow and Aberdeen - saw a 12.5% increase in the number of people going to or coming from foreign destinations.

As first revealed by The Herald last month, New York is number one long-haul destination from Scotland, with flights from Edinburgh and Glasgow full of passengers taking advantage of the cheap dollar. About 50,000 of the 1.5 million passengers using the three BAA airports were heading direct for New York.

Traffic from Glasgow to Dubai - with Gulf-based airline Emirates - and New York alone was up 17.5% in November from the same month a year before. The number of international passengers from Edinburgh, mostly on short hops to Europe, jumped more than 30%. New routes to Spain, France, Portugal and Egypt from both big airports have proved popular.