In 1938 passenger facilities were added, which were used continuously until the implementation of a massive investment programme to make Prestwick compatible with the new jet transports which were becoming available. A runway extension, parallel taxiway, link road, and an all-new terminal building were opened by the Queen Mother in 1964. The extension of Runway 13/31 caused considerable disruption to road users as the main road from Monkton into Prestwick was now crossing the tarmac of the existing runway. This had to be strictly controlled by a "level crossing" type system until the new perimeter road was completed
The United States Air Force (USAF) had opened a base in 1952 on the site of the original airport using former Royal Air Force (RAF) facilities (the USAF Military Air Transport Service (MATS) 1631st Air Base Squadron), and in 1953 on the Monkton side of the airport, both used by the USAF MATS. This base closed in 1966, part of the site is still occupied by the Royal Navy with RNAS Prestwick, more popularly known as HMS Gannet, where a detachment of Sea Kings provide a search and rescue role, covering one of the largest SAR area of the UK including Ben Nevis, the Lakes, Northern Ireland and 200 NM (370 km; 230 mi) past the Irish coast.There had been proposed plans drawn up pre-war for the post war years which would have been classed as extremely ambitious, especially in the austere post-war years. Among the various proposals was a 4 mile long main runway, an integral freight yard and railway station, and a semi enclosed mooring for flying boats and other amphibious aircraft. However, the runway was never lengthened to that degree, and the decline in seaplane and flying boat operations also meant that the latter proposal was never enacted. It is telling however, that many years since those proposals were made, that Prestwick Airport does have its own railway station, something that even Glasgow Airport does not have.
Scottish Aviation built a factory using the original terminal building and hangars at Prestwick, which produced such aircraft as the Prestwick Pioneers, and later the Jetstream and Bulldog. One part of the factory, the large white art-deco building which remains to this day, had in fact been the Palace of Engineering that had been built as part of the Empire Exhibition at Bellahouston Park in Glasgow in 1938. When Scottish Aviation merged with British Aerospace as a result of the Aircraft and Shipbuilding Industries Act, BAe maintained aircraft production at the site until 1998, primarily updates of the Jetstream line. Today BAE Systems retains a small facility at Prestwick for its Regional Aircraft division, with the adjoining main manufacturing site, producing components for Airbus and Boeing aircraft, having been sold to Spirit AeroSystems in January 2006.
In the beginning, Prestwick was the only Scottish airport allowed to operate a transatlantic link, largely due to the very benign weather conditions on the Ayrshire coast. Indeed, with a much lower incidence of fog than any other airport in Great Britain due to a geological anomaly, Prestwick has the reputation of being "Britain's only fog-free airport". This is perhaps one reason it managed to avoid total closure when it appeared that BAA seemed to be running down operations. It was also partly a political decision to silence those that questioned why Glasgow needed two airports when Glasgow Corporation had already invested money building Glasgow Airport.
Although British Airways had ceased regular passenger operations in the late 1970s, BA continued to intermittently use Prestwick as a site for pilot training, especially for training Concorde pilots. Concorde became a semi-regular visitor to the airport, and indeed BA and a number of other major airlines still use Prestwick for pilot training.
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