With
a massive of population of 1.3 billion people, you know the Chinese always need
big facilities to accommodate such large amount of people living in the
country. Despite the Chinese government’s effort to control its population,
China’s population is expected to hit the 1.4 billion mark in a few years’
time. Beijing Capital Airport, Asia’s busiest airport had already exceeded the
airport’s capacity of 75 million passengers per year. Therefore, a new airport
is definitely on the cards given the enormous wealth of the Chinese government
generated by the country’s positive economic growth in these few years.
The
second main airport (third in total) in Beijing will locate in the southern
part of Beijing in the district of Daxing. The distance from the city center to
the planned area is about 30km. A high-speed bullet train has been planned to
transport passengers from the planned airport to the city center in 30 minutes
time. The size of the airport is almost 7.5km each side. The airport’s size is
something like a size of Bermuda.
The
airport is expected to have an initial capacity of 130 million. The ambitious plan
for the airport in the future is to handle up to 200 million passengers per
year! The number is almost three times more the population of UK, nearly
two-third of the population of USA.
If
you don’t have an idea of how big the number 130 million is, let me give you
some stats of airports across the world. Currently, the busiest airport in the
world- Atlanta Hartsfield International Airport handled 92 million passengers
in 2011. New York’s JFK Airport handles 47 million passengers each year. Tokyo’s
Haneda Airport handles 62 million passengers per year. While London’s Heathrow
Airport, the largest international airport handles 69 million passengers each
year. The total of JFK and Heathrow is still 24 million less than initial
planned capacity of the newly-planned Beijing second airport! The total of the
current London’s passenger volume which includes Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted,
Luton, City and Southend, all 6 London airports is 127 million. It’s still 3
million shy of the Beijing’s newly-planned airport! Wow! That’s really very
big!
The
new airport plans to operate 8 runways to minimize the time for aircrafts taxi
from the gates to runway. It is to avoid heavy traffic and wasting unwanted
time like London Heathrow which has only 2 runways despite serving up to 67
million passengers.
It
is likely that the existing Beijing Capital Airport will likely be used after
the opening of the new Beijing second airport in 2017. That means Beijing has a
total capacity of up to 205 million in 2017 if both airports are operated in
full capacity. This figure easily exceeded those numbers at New York or London.
The
new Beijing second airport reportedly will be home to China Eastern Airlines,
China Southern Airlines and Hainan Airlines operations. While Air China and its
Star Alliance members are expected to continue operate from Beijing Capital
Airport. All Oneword, Skyteam, unaffiliated airlines including low-cost carrier
is expected to continue operate from the new Beijing Airport.
There
will be 45 new airports that will come into operation by 2015 which will add to
the 175 airports that currently China has despite 130 of them are losing money.
China is way behind in terms of airports in the country. Countries like Mexico,
France and Australia has more than 250 airports in their country. Given the
enormous population in China, airports will be one of the main infrastructures
being built in China apart from skyscrapers in the coming years. The country
has already recorded double-digit air travel growth in these past few years.
One
concern for the China’s aviation industry is that, the country’s bullet train service
is expanding even faster than air traffic. The country’s high-speed rail already
has a total length of 9,676km and the country’s plan is to build up to 25,000km
of railway across the country. In 2011, the country’s high speed rail is
expected to have diverted 15,600-71,200 travelers a day from all airlines in
China.
By,
Zhe Xu
12/10/2012
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