Miami International Airport is the main airport serving the Miami Metropolitan Area. the airport is located eight miles (13 km) northwest of the central business district of Miami, in unincorporated Miami-Dade County, Florida, United States. It is between the cities of Miami, Hialeah, Doral, and Miami Springs, the village of Virginia Gardens, and the unincorporated community of Fountainbleau. In September 2008, the airport regained its title as the busiest in Florida.

The airport is a hub for passenger airlines American Airlines, American Eagle, Gulfstream International Airlines under the Continental Connection name, and Executive Air under the American Eagle name; cargo airlines Arrow Air, UPS Airlines and FedEx Express; and charter airline Miami Air. Miami International Airport handles flights to cities throughout the Americas and Europe, as well as cargo flights to Asia, and is South Florida's main airport for long-haul international flights, although most domestic and low-cost carriers use Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport and Palm Beach International Airport, which charge significantly lower fees to tenant airlines.

Miami is a major gateway between the United States and Latin America, and, along with Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson Airport, Miami is one of the largest aerial gateways into the American South, owing to its proximity to tourist attractions, local economic growth, large local Latin American and European populations, and strategic location to handle connecting traffic between North America, Latin America, and Europe. As of 2008, MIA is the twenty-nine largest airport in the world in terms of passenger traffic. In the past, it has been a hub for Braniff International, Eastern Air Lines, Air Florida, the original National Airlines, the original Pan Am, United Airlines, and Iberia. As an international gateway to the United States it ranks third, behind New York-JFK in New York City and LAX in Los Angeles. Miami is also the proposed hub of two new start-up airlines, one which hopes to use the Eastern Airlines name.

In 2007, 33,740,416 passengers traveled through the airport.

In the first 10 months of 2007 more international passengers boarded U.S. carriers at Miami International than at any other U.S. airport.

History

In 1945, the City of Miami established a Port Authority and raised bond revenue to purchase the airport, which had meanwhile been renamed 36th Street Airport, from Pan Am. It was merged with an adjoining Army airfield in 1949 and expanded further in 1951. The old terminal on 36th Street was closed in 1959 when the modern passenger terminal (since greatly expanded) opened for service.