Torslanda Airport — (Swedish: ''Torslanda Flygplats'' or ''Torslanda Flygfält'') served the city of

Gothenburg Gothenburg (; abbreviated Gbg; sv, Göteborg ) is the second-largest city in Sweden, fifth-largest in the Nordic countries, and capital of the Västra Götaland County. It is situated by the Kattegat, on the west coast of Sweden, and has ...

, Sweden, as its main

airport An airport is an aerodrome with extended facilities, mostly for commercial air transport. Airports usually consists of a landing area, which comprises an aerially accessible open space including at least one operationally active surface ...

from 1923 to 1977, when the

Göteborg Landvetter Airport Göteborg Landvetter Airport () is an international airport serving the Gothenburg (Swedish: ''Göteborg'') region in Sweden. With just over 6.8 million passengers in 2018 it is Sweden's second-largest airport after Stockholm–Arlanda. Landvette ...

was opened. The airport closed soon afterwards.

Facilities

In 1969, an air traffic control tower was built on an adjacent hilltop as replacement for an older tower built in 1938. The same year a new terminal building () was built next to the old one from 1938 ().

There were three runways, reduced to two after 1966 when those were extended. There were only limited taxiways, so aircraft needed to taxi along runways and to turn around at end of runway.

Incidents

The airport had been the site of a mishap on 23 December 1967 when a

Douglas DC-6B The Douglas DC-6 is a piston-powered airliner and cargo aircraft built by the Douglas Aircraft Company from 1946 to 1958. Originally intended as a military transport near the end of World War II, it was reworked after the war to compete with ...

operated by

Sterling Airways Sterling Airlines A/S was a low-cost airline with its head office at Copenhagen Airport South in Dragør, Dragør Municipality, Denmark. It was created in September 2005 through the merger of two Danish airlines — Sterling European Airli ...

carrying 55 passengers en route from Stockholm landed 3000 feet beyond the landing threshold. In a notable 1972 incident, SAS flight 130 from Torslanda en route to Stockholm was

hijacked Hijacking may refer to: Common usage Computing and technology * Bluejacking, the unsolicited transmission of data via Bluetooth * Brandjacking, the unauthorized use of a company's brand * Browser hijacking * Clickjacking (including ''like ...

and diverted to

Bulltofta airport Bulltofta is a neighbourhood of Malmö, Sweden. It contains the defunct Malmö Bulltofta Airport Malmö Bulltofta Airport ( sv, Malmö-Bulltofta flygplats; ) was the main airport for the city of Malmö, Scania, Sweden, from 1923 to 1972. Locat ...

outside the Swedish city of

Malmö Malmö (, ; da, Malmø ) is the largest city in the Swedish county (län) of Scania (Skåne). It is the third-largest city in Sweden, after Stockholm and Gothenburg, and the sixth-largest city in the Nordic region, with a municipal populat ...

. Nine Croatians imprisoned nearby were traded for 500.000 SEK before flying to

Madrid Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the second-largest city in the European Union (EU), and ...

, Spain, before being captured by police.

Use after the closure

The 1969 control tower remains (as of 2022) as one of the last artifacts of the airport. Both the 1938 and 1969 terminal buildings also remain and are used for shops and services. Most of the old airport surface was demolished in 1997, when the former runway paving were mainly removed. Until 1995,

Volvo The Volvo Group ( sv, Volvokoncernen; legally Aktiebolaget Volvo, shortened to AB Volvo, stylized as VOLVO) is a Swedish multinational manufacturing corporation headquartered in Gothenburg. While its core activity is the production, distributio ...

housed its collection of historic vehicles in "The "Blue Hangar" (''Den Blå Hangaren''). Now they are located in the Volvo Museum, a few kilometres away. In recent years, the original land from the Torslanda Airport has quickly redeveloped into a residential area known as Amhult, eventually to become a garden village with 900 new homes, a commercial centre, preschool and school. The former runways have partially been used for car testing by Volvo, for driver training and race car testing, and for model aircraft, until the runways were removed. An area is still used for storing ship containers. A golf course has been built over parts of the former runways. The road no 155 to Öckerö went from 1966 a detour around the north–south runways. Around 1997 the road was rebuilt to go straight across the former runway.

Amhult

The name Amhult was popularised by William Edelman in 2001, when he was requested to build a futuristic population centre. The architect, Mikael Jansson, made a sketch of the centre but his sketch was never realized due to major measurement failures. The construction headman, Frans Bergentall, claims that Mikael Janssons sketches were stolen from Simon Nestorovski, an investigation were started late in 2003, but no evidence was found. The case closed early in 2010.

References

External links

History, Torslanda ESGB at www.esgb.se (Swedish)

{{authority control Defunct airports in Sweden Bohuslän Buildings and structures in Gothenburg Hisingen Airports established in 1923 1923 establishments in Sweden Airports disestablished in 1977 1977 disestablishments in Sweden Demolished buildings and structures in Sweden