Edinburgh Airport has installed a new chief executive with deep roots in both the city and the industry. Mark Johnston, until recently chief operating officer at London Gatwick, took charge of Scotland’s busiest airport at the start of October, succeeding Gordon Dewar after a tenure of fourteen years that reshaped the airport’s scale and standing.
The Edinburgh Airport chief executive appointment pairs a proven operator with a business entering the largest capital investment programme in its history. For an airport that now carries more than seventeen million passengers a year, the choice of leader signals a clear intent: keep the operational discipline that Gatwick colleagues praised, and apply it to a much bigger building agenda at home in Scotland.
A homecoming for one of UK aviation’s seasoned operators
Johnston was born and raised in Edinburgh, and he has described the appointment as a privilege that connects his career with the city he calls home. His route to the top job reflects two decades of work across the UK airports sector, from managing director of Glasgow Airport to leading operations in the South East. That blend of Scottish roots and large-scale operational experience shaped the case for his appointment.
From Glasgow to Gatwick
Before his move to Edinburgh, Johnston spent two and a half years as chief operating officer at London Gatwick, the UK’s second largest airport with around 43 million annual passengers. There he was responsible for running a safe and efficient operation in a market he described as very challenging. He led the rollout of a major security upgrade and several airfield performance projects, including a signalling advance that made Gatwick the first single runway airport in the world to implement intelligent arrivals spacing.
Pierre-Hugues Schmit, chief executive of London Gatwick, credited Johnston with bringing a wealth of technical and management experience to the role and playing a critical part in the airport’s recent projects. The endorsement matters: Johnston’s new brief presses many of the same buttons, with capacity, resilience and passenger experience at the heart of the plan.
Why continuity appealed to the owners
Edinburgh Airport is owned by VINCI Airports and Global Infrastructure Partners, the same partnership that controls Gatwick, where the group is pursuing a six-year, £2bn growth programme of its own. Owners with a strong operational culture tend to pick leaders who share it, and Johnston’s record of delivering complex projects inside a co-owned airport made him a natural fit. His successor at Gatwick will be named in due course, leaving both parts of the portfolio in a period of managed transition.
The growth plans facing the new Edinburgh Airport chief executive
Johnston arrives as the airport sharpens its ambitions for the decade ahead. The investment programme is the clearest expression of those ambitions, and it will fall to the new chief executive to carry it from drawing board to departure gate. How he manages that task will help decide Scotland’s air connectivity for years to come.
The largest investment programme in the airport’s history
Edinburgh has begun a multi-year capital programme, reported at around £500 million, to expand capacity and lift the passenger experience. The works aim to strengthen connectivity, improve resilience and support the airport’s sustainability commitments, all while daily operations continue at record volumes. Delivering a build programme on this scale, in a terminal that never closes, ranks among the tougher assignments in UK infrastructure.
Building on Gordon Dewar’s record
Johnston inherits a business transformed. When Dewar became chief executive in 2012, the airport handled 9.2 million passengers; by 2025 the figure had reached seventeen million, making it Scotland’s busiest and best connected gateway. Dewar also presided over the 2024 sale to VINCI Airports and Global Infrastructure Partners, a deal that tied the airport’s future to one of the world’s largest airport operators. Johnston has paid public tribute to his predecessor, describing the business he takes over as exceptionally strong.
Scottish aviation gains a leader with a point to prove
The significance reaches beyond one airport. Scotland’s economy depends heavily on air links, and Edinburgh’s expansion will shape the country’s route network for a decade. Investors and the wider business community will watch how the new chief executive balances growth, cost control and environmental commitments in a sector under close scrutiny.
An early test on the runway and in the boardroom
Johnston’s early priorities are clear: deliver the capital programme on time, hold service standards through the disruption of construction, and defend the airport’s position against competitive pressure from across Scotland and the North of England. He has also promised to work closely with the team Dewar built, whose reputation he says is recognised across the industry.
For a chief executive returning to his home city, the stakes are personal as well as professional. Edinburgh Airport’s owners have handed him the mandate and the balance sheet to grow a national asset. The next few years will show how much of the growth story is still left to write.