Source: AFP Author: Martin Abbugao, Ian Timberlake 01/07/2008
Subject Concerned: Opinion Airport
Singapore will on Jan. 9 open a new US$1.2 billion airport terminal that industry analysts say will reinforce its position as a regional aviation hub.
Terminal 3, boasting a five-story vertical garden with waterfalls, will receive its first passengers just months after a new terminal opened in Hong Kong and over a year after Bangkok's new airport began operating.
Competition is intensifying in a region where airline passenger growth is projected to increase faster than the global average.
Analysts say the new terminal will boost the appeal of Singapore's Changi Airport - particularly compared with its key challenger in Bangkok, which has been plagued with problems.
"It will push Singapore further ahead of its rivals," said Shukor Yusof, of Standard & Poor's Equity Research.
Terminal 3 offers 380,000 square meters of space in a seven-story building. It can handle 22 million passengers a year, bringing Changi's total capacity to about 70 million.
The new terminal will add 28 aerobridge gates to Changi, with up to eight designed to handle the world's biggest passenger plane, the superjumbo Airbus A380.
In October 2007, Singapore Airlines became the world's first carrier to fly the double-decker A380, and will be the first to operate from Terminal 3.
The new facility definitely reinforces Singapore's position, said Jim Eckes, managing director of Hong Kong-based aviation consulting firm Indoswiss Aviation.
The terminal has the ambience of a five-star hotel. Trees and plants dot the terminal, and the vertical garden, a wall covered with climbing plants and interspersed with waterfalls, provides a dramatic backdrop to the baggage-claim area.
One bank executive said the terminal will surely give Singapore an edge. It is more than twice as large as the 140,000-square-meter second terminal that opened in June at Hong Kong International Airport.
Since opening a decade ago, Hong Kong's airport has seen rapid passenger growth, reaching 44.4 million in 2006, ahead of Changi's record 35.03 million that year. But analysts say Hong Kong is not a direct competitor to Changi because as well as being an international hub, it is the gateway to the mainland's booming aviation market.
The International Air Transport Association (IATA) says Asia-Pacific passenger traffic will grow 5.9 percent annually up to 2011, faster than the 5.1 percent global average, and both Hong Kong and Singapore built their new terminals to tap the rising demand.
"When Singapore builds something, they don't do it for now; they do it for five, 10 years ahead," Yusof said.
Peter Harbison, executive chairman of the Sydney-based Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation consultancy, said: "The whole concept of always building ahead of demand is why Singapore has kept its leadership in the region."
In September 2006, Thailand opened its new US$3 billion Suvarnabhumi Airport with an initial capacity of 45 million passengers per year in an attempt to establish Bangkok as the region's aviation hub.
But the airport has suffered from overcrowding and cracks in the runways as well as complaints about safety and sanitation.
It opened at roughly the same time Singapore completed a S$240-million upgrade of its second terminal and shortly after it opened a separate terminal for budget airlines.
"It's a mark of what Singapore has always done to stay ahead of the game," said Tom Ballantyne, chief correspondent for the industry publication Orient Aviation.