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BEIJING: Beijing’s colossal new airport terminal
opened on Friday in time to cope with a deluge of visitors for this
summer’s Olympics, a landmark event for the Chinese capital in its
frantic modernization drive.
A Shandong Airlines flight from
eastern China touched down shortly before 9:00 a.m., becoming the
first commercial service to land at the airport’s $2.7-billion
Terminal Three.
Five airlines began their
operations there on Friday, including British Airways and Qantas,
with a further 19 moving to complete the transfer on March 25,
according to airport officials.
“I am very excited . . . this
is the world’s largest terminal building. We are proud of its
design and construction,” airport chairman Wang Jiadong told
reporters.
Renowned British architect Norman
Foster designed the airport to appear like a giant dragon, with a
long tail and triangular-shaped skylights that are meant to resemble
the scales of the beast.
As with almost anything in modern
China, the scale and the numbers behind the new terminal are
stunning.
The building runs for 3.25
kilometers (2 miles) and covers 98 hectares (245 acres) of floor
space, the equivalent to about 170 soccer pitches.
“To get an idea of the scale,
imagine (all five) Heathrow terminals under one roof and then add an
extra 17 percent of floor space,” Foster told the Chinese press
this week, referring to London’s main airport.
“It has taken Heathrow 50 years
to grow to its present scale. In Beijing, the process should be
completed in less than five. Here is society changing by the power
of 10.”
Indeed, the airport was built in
less than four years, using a reported 50,000 workers and without
the restrictions of a critical press or public protests that often
hold up similar projects in the West.
More than 10,000 people in nine
villages were moved off their land to make way for the terminal,
while Chinese officials have said at least three workers had died
building it.
For the soaring numbers of
passengers traveling in and out of Beijing, the new terminal is
expected to offer relief from the delays and queues that plague air
travel in China.
Beijing airport handled 48
million passengers last year, way above its capacity of 35 million,
according to official statistics.
Beijing’s hosting of the
Olympics in August is expected to boost this number to over 60
million this year, comfortably within the upgraded airport’s new
capacity of 76 million.
When it is fully operational, it
will be able to handle 1,590 take-offs and landings every day
carrying about 208,000 passengers.
But analysts believe it will not
be too many years before the airport is again running beyond
capacity, reflecting a nationwide problem as aviation traffic booms
in parallel with China’s phenomenal economic growth.
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