The history of the airport at Punta Raisi dates back to 1953,
the year in which the "Autonomous Consortium for PalermoAirport”
was constituted. The Consortium was established with the aim of
creating an alternative to the ex-military airport of Bocca di
Falco which, while being the third busiest Italian airport for
national flights, was no longer able to deal with the ever-
increasing level of traffic. The construction of the new airport
received an initial five billion lira grant from the Italian
Government and the Consortium was charged with carrying out the
preliminary studies to choose a site. Two locations were taken
into account: one along the Gulf of Palermo between Aspra and
Acqua dei Corsari, the other at Punta Raisi in the Commune of
Cinisi. The Consortium independently chose Punta Raisi without
opening the question up to public tender as foreseen by Art. 2
of the Constitutional Act, and in contrast with the opinions of
authorities on the subject. General planning began. In March
1956 the project was