Visa arranged, bags packed and loose ends tied up, you’re ready to leave and getting there shouldn’t be a problem as aviation has played a key part in Dubai’s success. Heaps of airlines fly there, from the better known such as British Airways, Lufthansa and Virgin Atlantic, to the more unfamiliar Gulf Air and Turkish Airlines. Dubai is roughly a 6 hour flight from most major western European cities and currently out of range for the budget carriers, although that doesn’t mean that it’s prohibitively expensive. Qatar Airways, for example, fly between London Heathrow and Dubai sometimes for as little as €250 return.

If you’re looking to travel in comfort and style, then turn to the region’s national airline, Emirates, which is regularly voted the world’s best in terms of customer satisfaction. Much like Dubai itself, the bigger the better seems to be the motto for the airline, as in 2005 it placed the biggest deal in aviation history when it ordered 42 Boeing 777s worth €7.4billion.

Dubai International Airport is the aviation equivalent of the good looking girl in school who compensated for her emotional insecurity by becoming ‘friendly’ with every member of the rugby team. And the football team. And a few of the teachers. The airport is tax-free, trade barrier free and operates an open-skies policy, meaning that any airline can fly in and out without any reciprocal deals. Unsurprisingly, that makes it busy.

The airport currently sees around 30 million passengers pass through each year, as the emirate welcomes over 5 million tourists. Over the next ten years, however, that figure is expected to rise to over 20 million visitors; always keen to build another gargantuan, costly building, this was all the excuse needed for the locals to build a new airport.

It’s almost unnecessary to mention that the New Jebel Ali City Airport will be the biggest in the world – this is Dubai, after all – but it’s still impressive to discover it’ll be ten times larger than the current one, which all of a sudden seems like a seedy little landing strip in comparison. The size of London Heathrow and Chicago O’Hare combined, it’ll have six parallel runways and the capability of dealing with 120 million passengers and 12 million tonnes of cargo a year.

Rumour has it that, once finished, the designers and engineers responsible will attempt to put the moon on a stick.