A Tale of Two Airports

An objective can have different results in different societies.

When Queen Elizabeth II helped launch London Heathrow Airport's $8.6 billion (£4.3 billion) new Terminal 5 on March 14 2008, people in aviation industry were quick to compare the new $2.8 billion (£1.4 billion) terminal at Beijing Capital International Airport, which began operation on February 29 2008.

Both airport projects have the same objective: to increase airport capacity. Heathrow has had one of the worst rates of airport delays in the world. Complaints from the business community that Heathrow's logjam could jeopardize London's status as a global financial center. Beijing's new glass and steel airport terminal is a centerpiece project for the 2008 Olympics Games designed to relieve its overloaded airport terminals and to accommodate expected growth in the number of visitors to Beijing.

While Heathrow Terminal 5's opening came after 15 years of planning and construction and protests by local residents and environmental groups, Beijing's new airport terminal took four years to build. In size, Heathrow's Terminal 5 is one third the size of Beijing's Terminal 3. That is not all. Beijing's new Terminal 3 is 17% bigger than the combined floor space of all of Heathrow's terminals, including the new Terminal 5. Can this fast-growing industry tolerate a 15-year project? The answer is a definitive no. To anticipate steep passenger traffic growth, Heathrow's BAA disclosed plans to build a sixth terminal at the airport.

Without going into much details, you can get an idea of what Beijing's Terminal 3 is like with a quote from Norman Foster, the Beijing Airport Terminal 3 project's architect, "It's the world's largest and most advanced airport building". Norman Foster is also the architect who designed the Hong Kong International Airport, which was named best airport in the world in the 2007 passenger survey results.

In term of airport facility, airport's capacity comes in two flavors: boarding gates and runways. Terminals provide boarding gates. Runways determine the number of aircrafts that can use an airport's runways simultaneously. Aside from bad weather, the number of active runways at a major airport at any given time is also a determining factor of its maximum capacity. As part of Beijing's Terminal 3 project, a third runway is completed to handle aircrafts as big as the Airbus A380. In comparison, Heathrow's third runway is still in the pipeline despite some vociferous opposition. Hundreds of houses will be demolished to make way for the new runway and the new Terminal 6.

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