Hong Kong International Airport (HKIA) revealed details for the first phase of a major expansion project aimed at increasing passenger capacity by 10 million passengers annually with the construction of a midfield concourse.
The project, costing HK$7 billion (US$890 million), will create a new concourse to the west of Terminal 1 between the two runways linked by an underground automatic "people mover" (APM) or mass transit system. Initially, the midfield concourse was designed as an elongated "X" shape in the Masterplan 2020, but will now be an "I" shape, five-story building.
There will also be a new taxiway and 20 aircraft parking stands to reduce aircraft congestion. Out of the 20 stands, 11 are served by air bridges, of which three will be wide enough to serve the Airbus A380.
Construction is scheduled to begin in the third quarter of this year and will be completed by 2015.
An HKIA spokesperson said: "The new midfield concourse will allow 10 million passengers to embark and disembark aircraft using airbridges, sparing them the potential inconvenience of being exposed to inclement weather conditions when compared with using remote bays."
Eva Cheng, Hong Kong secretary for transport and housing, said: "On the software front, the government will continue to pursue a progressive liberalisation policy on air services, encouraging airlines to add more services ssso as to strengthen the international network and transit role of the airport."
Additionally, the midfield concourse will be built with several environmentally friendly features: the floor-to-ceiling facade will use high-performance glazing that will deflect approximately 40
percent of solar heat therefore enabling the concourse to use less airconditioning as well as low-energy lighting.
This development comes after Hong Kong Ideas Centre, a Hong Kong based think tank, highlighted in a study the urgent need for the development of a third runway at the airport (see story here). The study stated that HKIA is the third busiest airport in the world and is set to surpass its capacity of 87 million passengers per year by 2017. Last year, the airport handled 51 million passengers with traffic predicted to reach 57 million passengers per year by 2020.
Alisha Haridasani
