Designed to take the pressure off the overcrowded Beijing Capital International Airport, the new site south of the city will be able to handle some 72 million passengers a year.
By Timothy Bragg, Ph. D. ERAU
July 4, 2019
By 2040 the hub is expected to have expanded to eight runways, including one for military use, and will be able to welcome some 100 million passengers a year.
Beijing's second international airport has been completed and it's expected to become one of the world's busiest. Beijing is set to open it's eye-catching multi-billion dollar airport resembling a massive shining starfish, to accommodate soaring air traffic in China and celebrate the Communist government's 70th anniversary in power.
Work on the Beijing Daxing International Airport (BDIA) officially ended on schedule on June 30, ready for a September 30 inauguration, on the eve of the anniversary of the foundation of the People's Republic on October 1, 1949 by Moa Zedoing.
Workers walk through the terminal building.
The two combined airports will handle 170 million fliers annually by 2025, according to official estimates. A new Airport Express Train is planned to be used in 2020 and Jingba Intercity high speed rail, passing it, will also run by 2019.
Celebrations of the event will see President Xi Jinping reviewing a huge military parade through the center of Beijing, with the opening of the futuristic hub a fitting embodiment of the "Chinese dream" he had offered his fellow citizens.
Located 46 kilometers south of Tiananmen square, the new airport will operate at full capacity in 2025, with four runways and potential to receive 72 million passengers per year.
By 2040 the hub is expected to have expanded to eight runways, including one for military use, and will be able to welcome 100 million passengers per year, which will make it the world's largest single terminal in terms of traveler capacity according to its designers.
Atlanta airport, in the United States, can currently receive more than a hundred million passengers, but across two terminals.
The current Beijing Daxing International Airport...the world's second largest is all ready overflowing, with over 100 million passengers annually.
Air transport is booming in China as living standards increase along with peoples desire to travel. Indeed, it will pass the U.S. to become the world's biggest aviation market by the mid-2020's, according to the International Air Transportation Association.
The country will see 1.6 billion plane journeys each year from 2037 a billion more than in 2017, the organization estimates. China's capital--with its 21 million people, expects to welcome 170 million passengers in 2025, split between two airports.
At 700,000 square meters about the size of a hundred footballs pitches, the new structure will be one of the world's largest airport terminals. The building was designed by Anglo-Iraqi architect Zaha Hadid, who died in 2016, in conjunction with the engineering subsidiary of Aeroports de Paris.
Inside, it stands out for its flowing, curved lines and use of light that filter down to the lowest levels of the building 🏛through openings in the roof. Underneath the terminal is a train station and metro line that will allow travelers to reach the city center in 20-minutes.
The project cost 120 billion yuan ($17.5 billion), or 400 billion if rail and road links are included. State television channel CCTV reported that the SkyTeam alliance, which includes Delta Air France and KLM, will move over to the new airport along with its partner Eastern
Airlines and China Southern Airlines.
The third largest Chinese airline, Air China, is expected to keep flying the bulk of its flights from Beijing Capital International Airport. (-:
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