Passengers looking to get away from Ireland for a short holiday or weekend break this winter can now broaden their destination plans as Dublin Airport has announced 19 new routes.

These new routes include potential short trips to Inverness (Scotland) and Cologne (Germany) as well as the continuation of long-haul flights to San Francisco (USA) and Toronto (Canada).

Dublin Airport says that they will have an extra 950,000 seats available this upcoming winter, a 10% rise from the same time last year.

Speaking about the new announcement, the airport’s Managing Director,Vincent Harrison said, “These new winter services, coupled with the additional frequency and capacity on many existing routes, significantly strengthens Dublin Airport’s route network, providing even more choice and flexibility for our customers.”

The introduction of Dublin Airport’s Terminal 2 in November 2010 and its sustained success has seen the transport hub become increasingly popular among tourists and those passing by on stop-over flights.

Dublin Airport is ranked just outside the top 20 busiest airports in Europe. It handled nearly 20.2 million passengers in 2013 and that number is set to rise significantly come the end of 2014.

The airport has a large presence on social media and their free WiFi service is in contrast to many other airports around the world where customers have to pay to access the internet. It has 89,400 Twitter followers, over 6,300 Instagram followers and over 60,500 likes on Facebook.

The airport’s ability to generate business interest for Ireland was rewarded in September 2014 when they won an aviation marketing award at the World Routes Award ceremony in Chicago.

With new routes planned to Reykjavik (Iceland), Helsinki (announced by Finnair) and a link from Los Angeles to Addis Ababa (Ethiopia) for 2015, residents of Dublin and the wider commuter belt can start to plan some exciting escapes.