credit Photo: AP
They’re still going to lose your luggage. You’ll still be wedged into the middle seat. But at least your hours of preboarding delay carry the promise of wonder and luxury: In the next two years, a dozen international airports will open gigantic new terminals, most of them big enough to accommodate the superjumbo Airbus A380 and tens of thousands of passengers a day. None of which will actually improve your flight — only a superjumbo cocktail can do that.Pudong, Shanghai Cost $1.2 billion (est.) Size 5.2 million sq. ft. The elegant design of Terminal 2, evoking a soaring gull (flight motifs are big in airport architecture), offers many improvements on the old terminal, built a decade ago. This one, for example, is rumored to feature both up and down escalators. Fancy.
Capital, Beijing Cost $3.7 billion Size 10 million sq. ft. Starchitect Norman Foster wraps his megasize Terminal 3 around a $258 million, German-built baggage system that can handle 19,000-plus pieces of luggage an hour. And it’s a good thing: The facility will serve 1.4 million passengers a week during the Olympics.
credit Photo: Tim Griffith
Changi, Singapore Cost $1.2 billion Size 693,920 sq. ft. The 919 skylights, floor-to-ceiling glass walls, and five-story vertical garden with waterfalls make the recently opened Terminal 3 sound soothing. The granite floors sound like murder on your feet.
credit Photo: British Airways
Heathrow, London Cost $8.5 billion Size 3.8 million sq. ft. How to rule Britannia: 120-foot ceilings and a view of Windsor Castle. Plus, groovy little electric "pods" to shuttle passengers between the new Terminal 5 and the parking lot. And the baggage-handling gremlins that delayed flights earlier this year? Seem cleared out, guv’nor.
credit Photo: Gensler
John F. Kennedy, New York Cost $800 million Size 650,000 sq. ft. Due to open this fall, JetBlue’s new home in Terminal 5 incorporates the classic, Eero Saarinen-designed TWA hub. The security checkpoint has a whopping 20 lanes, which means the trip to your gate may be the only leg of your journey that’s not delayed.
Indira Gandhi, Delhi Cost $1.5 billion Size 2.7 million sq. ft. Part of a massive airport modernization project, Terminal 3 sits adjacent to what promises to be one of Asia’s longest runways — 14,500 feet, or almost 3 miles. North-facing windows let in Delhi’s lovely natural light but exclude its searing natural heat.
