Steve Hunt of Nav Canada says air traffic controllers are needed now in Fredericton because of the increase in traffic. (CBC)Air traffic controllers are returning to the Fredericton International Airport, starting Thursday.

There haven't been air traffic controllers in the tower since Nav Canada took over flight services from Transport Canada in 1996.

Nav Canada controllers in Moncton direct flights into Fredericton, said spokesman Steve Hunt.

But traffic in Fredericton is up 50 per cent this year, since the Moncton Flight College set up a campus at the airport.

About 12 full-time air traffic controllers are expected to be phased in.

"We had some temporary controllers come in and they're going to take over the control service for a period of time of up to around 14 months," Hunt said.

"And they have come in the middle of November and have got some training with respect to local awareness as well as they've been doing on-the-job familiarization in order to assume the role of air traffic control."

That will allow service specialists in Fredericton, who now control activity on the runways and advise pilots of aircraft movements and weather conditions, to retrain as air traffic controllers.

Fredericton airport president David Innes says having on-site air traffic controllers is the international standard. (CBC)Airport president David Innes expects having local air traffic controllers will be good for business.

"Air traffic control is well understood around the world as being kind of an international standard that everybody understands," he said. "So when we're selling our airport and our services to people in other countries, they'll certainly understand the traffic control system here better than perhaps they did in the past."

The local air traffic controllers will be able to avert any potential conflicts between aircraft by directing them in which order to land.

The Fredericton airport has been the busiest airport in Canada without a control tower. According to numbers compiled by the airport for May, planes travelled across its runways 10,000 times, landing and taking off. That's double the number at the next busiest airport without a tower, officials said.