[muppet]

Beijing Capital's new Terminal 3, the worlds largest airport and worlds largest building by floor area:

It was built in 4 years and jumped passengers from 21 million in 2000 to 54 million in 2008, ranking from 47th to 8th in that time.
It has capacity for over 100 million but may never reach it. There are already plans for a new airport to be built in 2010, to be opened in 2015.
The Terminal covers 10.6 million square ft.



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[muppet]

Overviews:

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Believe it or not there are plans to build a new airport in 2010

[muppet]

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[staff]

I'll be there in a couple of weeks. Can't wait!

[Grego43]

Elegant!

[VivaLFuego]

Wild. How much did this cost, and how was it funded? (morbid curiosity)

[Ayreonaut]

That's so awesome. Now I have to plan a trip to Beijing, even if that's all I see.

[urbanfan89]

Hard to believe they're already planning a second airport.:yes:

[LosAngelesBeauty]

Believe it or not there are plans to build a new airport in 2010


Nice pics. Great design and shows how far China has come in such a short time.

However, all I see is "oil." Or the declining supply of it, that is. With Peak Oil upon us, these grandiose airports being built in up and coming cities across the world will become obsolete as nations scramble to scrap up the last trillion or so barrels left on the planet, with ever declining production.

[DJM19]

Very nice! Maybe one of my favorite airport designs

[PA Pride]

Spacious! Nice pics.

[Westsidelife]

I was there back in April. It was amazing.

[theWatusi]

looking good

[Boris2k7]

Another masterpiece by Lord Foster

[Jonas]

I don't know what to say... it's just mental. Anything else sucks compared to that...

[ColDayMan]

The chairs...I want those chairs!

[Buckeye Native 001]

Holy mother of christ that place is massive!

[crazyjoeda]

It is defiantly big and very impressive, but I don't like the way it looks inside. It doesn't look very inviting or interesting (except for the ceiling).

[KevinFromTexas]

Amazing. How many gates does it have? How many can it accommodate?

[anm]

impressive

[combusean]

Holy cow! Some of those photos, esp the ones by mtuk for some reason induce goosebumps.

Impressive facility with lots of elegant colors and clean lines. Would love to be inside it someday. :tup:

[Jonas]

there seems to be an entire Discovery Chnnel documentary about that loaded on Youtube (this is part 1, the rest can be easily navigated through Youtube). Truly impressive: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=B-R7U5pkDwo&feature=related

[Top Of The Park]

looks like DIA and several American airports will move one back on the world rankings...pretty much from here on out. I wonder if Dubai will be next?

[oliveurban]

Definitely impressive.

Why would they build another airport altogether? Will there be no room for an additional expansion of this one, or do they want the city to have two airports? Seems a little wasteful, no?

[Doady]

Hopefully no compromises were made during construction. Could prove deadly in the future if there is a major earthquake.

[muppet]

Definitely impressive.

Why would they build another airport altogether? Will there be no room for an additional expansion of this one, or do they want the city to have two airports? Seems a little wasteful, no?


Basically China will become the worlds largest destination for overseas visitors by 2015 (overtaking from France), and the 4th largest source of outcoming tourists too. Big as it already is, further airport expansion is critical to accommodate for that with Beijing expected to become one of the worlds most visited cities and changeovers.

[LosAngelesBeauty]

Doing some simple calculations, by 2015, the world would have burned through 189,800,000,000 barrels of oil (7.9716 × 10^12 gallons!). That's using an average of 80 million barrels of oil accounting for declines. The world currently uses 85 million barrels of oil a day, but peak oil will make that figure go down, even with insatiable demand from countries like China.

Now, even though there are a few larger oil fields left that can add a few million barrels a day to the overall production, they would not be introduced to the market until 7-10 years from now IF they started today because there is a 5-10 year delay between discovery of oil fields, building of infrastructure to extract and refine, and introduction to the market.

So you don't have to be a math wiz to figure out that with an 1% decline in oil production annually (at some point in time in the near future when production drops from its current plateau), by the time any new oil is introduced to the market from new oil reserves, there is no way it could offset the decline.

That basically translates to a shrinking airline industry, not an expanded airline industry. You must not forget WHY people FLY. It's for business and pleasure. Both entail robust economies to yield more flights. Why else would so many people fly? If there is a global recession/depression, people won't be clamoring to get onboard any plane. Already, airlines are feeling the pain, and it's only 2008! Oil ain't going to get much cheaper, just higher from here on out.

So for Beijing to build ANOTHER airport would be a terrible mistake. They should be using that money to built WIND and SOLAR farms to reduce their dependency on COAL powered plants. Preparing for the future in that way is a bit smarter than building a grand empty shell.

[alexjon]

If words could be converted into energy, there'd be enough oil in your posts to drag the national average on a gallon of gas to the 15 cent range, LosAngelesBeauty.

[LosAngelesBeauty]

^ I'll take that as a compliment.

[muppet]

actually China is building wind and solar farms by the thousands, its spending $200 billion a year on improving environmental issues and has the strictest eco-laws in the world. However another lobby of govt (the capitalist one) is still opening coal powered power stations (nowhere near as bad as they used to be but still coal powered nonetheless). Also the environmental lobby is complaining that 90percent of its laws go unenforced and rely on hundreds of thousands of grass roots green groups for reporting. The govt also estimates the country is robbed of 5% of its GDP every year to environmental catastrophes, and the govt knows full well the country, or the world, has no economic future on an American-even a European- model which is already at least 3x worst than worst-case scenario, and which if China or India alone had the same levels the world would run out of resources.

It aims to cut environmental emmissions by 20% and carbon output per capita within the next 2 years alone by more, to create an 'ecological civilisation' for the future. All eyes are on Dongtan, the worlds first carbon neutral city for 500,000 currently being built outside Shanghai. If successful it will become the blueprint of all cities in China, and some say the world.


Its current successes are the worlds largest refforestation programs, with a new one that is affecting 90 percent of China's land area - planting native trees covering the equivalent size of California State. Also every major city is getting more and more cars as the population gets richer but the govt is creating 5000km of metro under construction at the moment, as well as fast speed rail and bus network extensions. The three worlds biggest metros, each one much larger than current record holder London's, are all being built in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen.

The problems are in the overall size of China and the millions of people. For example although Beijing, the worst offendor for cars, will soon have 3.5 million private cars by 2010, 13 million people will still travel by public bus and 6 million by metro/rail daily. That is a huge project.

[LosAngelesBeauty]

^ I don't doubt that there is truth to what you're saying. However, building another airport in Beijing is foolish considering that oil prices will continue to increase, esp. as Chinese' standard of living continues to develop into a higher one, like that of America. More and more Chinese will demand to drive and that won't fare well with global oil capacity.

It's also known here in the US that there is a suburban replica of "Orange County" near Shanghai that is under development. The funny thing is, the picture I saw of it had a huge Hummer parked in front of the tract house! What a disgusting sight! That is far from being "green" and responsible to the environment. The real Orange County is an environmental lost cause. There isn't single rail line (outside of Metrolink) that can get people around that sprawling mess. Why would China want to copy that?

Anyway, the new Beijing terminal looks great. I hope it works out well for Beijing when people from all over the world fly in for the Olympics in August. But keep in mind that building another airport is a terrible financial decision.

[BigBird9]

Holy crap.

That is huge. But why in God's name would they build another airport???:koko:

[urbanfan89]

Holy crap.

That is huge. But why in God's name would they build another airport???:koko:

Just look at it this way: China has had an obsession with mega-mega-megaprojects for thousands of years. And why stop now?

[youngregina]

Did no one listen to the facts that were displayed throughout that documentary on it. It was saying that they had to keep expanding the design because of passenger projections, which were supposed to surpass 60 million a year.

[LosAngelesBeauty]

^ Are you not listening to the fact that oil prices are going up and how that will affect every single aspect our of modern existence?

The documentary you saw was most likely made before the barrel of oil increased to its current high price ($145 a barrel). Most people on the planet were/are unaware of peak oil and what it entails. Of course they're going to accept the projections for the future based on what is normal today and that oil will keep gushing out of the ground forever! It's that same irrational desire one has when they gamble in Las Vegas. You want to be optimistic that you're going to have the winning hand. Regarding the idea that Beijing needs another airport, it's foolish thinking partially stemmed from ignorance or denial of peak oil.

So no, it's not that we're not "listening" to your foolish documentary stating that Beijing Airport will surpass 60 million passengers, but that fundamental principles in pricing structure will render the super-sized airports obsolete as crude oil continues to rise unabated.

[LosAngelesBeauty]

Oh, I didn't know you're 14. All is forgiven. But read up and learn something!

[Nutterbug]

Before clicking the link, I was expecting it to be in Dubai.

I figured they'd build the world's biggest airport for the sake of it, even without the traffic to justify it.

[JDRCRASH]

Thats cool; this thing is gonna be HUGE!!!!

[StethJeff]

the look of the airport reminds me a lot of suvarnabhumi airport in bangkok. except of course that this one is 4 times bigger.

[Derek]

Imagine having to transfer to a flight all the way at the other end of the terminal.

:ack:

[JDRCRASH]

It's really hard to believe that its even bigger than the Pentagon, but then again, this is China, where everything seems to be bigger.

[Jersey Mentality]

Yes oil is on the decline in terms of new oil fields being found. But actually here on U.S. shores we have large surpluses of oil especially since the Saudis agreed to pump 2 million more gallon s a day. The main problem right now is that we havent built any large refineries since the 70s and even if we produced more oil our refining capacity still needs to catch up.

[JDRCRASH]

Yeah, I also heard we got (at most), 1.5 Trillion Barrels of oil locked up in sediment throughout the Rockie Mountains. The only problem is, you need to heat it at a high temp. to seperate the fossil fuel from those rocks.

What we could do is use that as leverage against countries that use childish rhetoric such as Russia, Venezuela, and of course, Iran, to back off, or risk losing an important customer.

[jcchii]

handsome interiors

[View2gowanus]

Cold, clean, slick. But most likely a Chinese folly after the Olympics. Loss/Gain, what do they care within a massive, overinflated bubble?

[urbanfan89]

But actually here on U.S. shores we have large surpluses of oil especially since the Saudis agreed to pump 2 million more gallon s a day.
Okay, so Saudi Arabia *is* the 51st state. You learn something every day.

What we could do is use that as leverage against countries that use childish rhetoric such as Russia, Venezuela, and of course, Iran, to back off, or risk losing an important customer.
This isn't the 1990s. It's a seller's market.