Helsinki-Malmi Airport (Finnish: Helsinki-Malmin lentoasema, Swedish: Helsingfors-Malm flygplats) (IATA: HEM, ICAO: EFHF) was an airfield that served Helsinki, the capital of Finland, located in the district of Malmi, 5.4 NM (10.0 km; 6.2 mi) north-north-east[1] of the city centre.

[2] The city of Helsinki, which owns the land the airport is located on, terminated its lease agreement for aviation purposes in December 2019, and its remaining runway was closed in March 2021,[3] but several legal complaints are pending in courts.

In the late 1930s, domestic air routes already reached all the major cities in Finland, and in 1940 it became possible to fly even to Petsamo in the far north.

It became evident that the runways, built originally on a deep layer of clay and swampy topsoil, would require considerable investment if they were to bear the weight of the new big airliners.

Cost estimates showed that extending the runways, adding pilework under them and strengthening them in other ways would be prohibitively expensive, and the plans were abandoned.

A new airfield built to international standards was first opened to traffic in 1952 in Vantaa, in time for the Olympics, today known as Helsinki Airport.

The closure of the airport was debated since about 2000, as the city of Helsinki needed the area for building housing for its growing population.

On 25 March 2014, the Finnish government made a framework decision in principle to close down Malmi Airport and hand it over to residential use by the early 2020s.

A prerequisite written into the government's decision was that the Border Guard and civil aviation were to be transferred to a substitute airfield.

[15] The aim of the initiative was to secure the future accessibility of Helsinki and Finland by air and to save the internationally acclaimed cultural heritage site.

In February 2008, the Ministry of Transport and Communications commissioned an environmental impact assessment (EIA) of the alternative sites.

The Ministry made in early 2010 a proposal to relevant planning authorities to organise co-operation in carrying out the EIA.

[17] The exceptionally well preserved pre-World War II aviation milieu of Malmi Airport has also received international recognition.

[18] The airport is also included in the Finnish selection of the international DoCoMoMo Workgroup dedicated to cataloguing and preserving buildings, monuments and sites of the modern movement.