Beijing’s $63 Bn Daxing Airport Opens

Beijing’s new airport, the CNY450 billion yuan (USD$63 billion) Daxing International, had its official opening ceremony and first commercial flight on Wednesday.

Images courtesy Zaha Hadid Architects

The Zaha Hadid-designed starfish-shaped terminal and four runways will initially handle 45 million passengers per year, and over 70 million by 2025. Its eventual design capacity is 100 million passengers and 4 million tonnes of cargo.

The terminal covers an area of 700,000 sq. m. (over 7.5 million sq ft), which is about the size of 100 football fields. It has 79 gates and can handle up to six Airbus A380s simultaneously.

The new airport’s first commercial flight, was a China Southern Airlines Airbus A380 service to the southern city of Guangzhou. China Southern and China Eastern Airlines will be the principal domestic carriers at Daxing.

In addition to domestic airlines, many international carriers including British Airways, Finnair, and Malaysia Airlines are scheduled to transfer from the city’s overcrowded Beijing Capital airport to Daxing.

The new airport is located 46 km south of central Beijing and will be served by express train from the city.