Architecture

8 Interesting Facts that you need to know about – Beijing Daxing International Airport

The Beijing Daxing International Airport, more commonly being known as the “Starfish” was recently opened on 25th September 2019. What is interesting to know is the biggest single-structure airport terminal throughout the world to date, covering a whopping area of more than 1,000,000 meter squares. This $63 billion airport terminal rests itself over a landmass of 47 square miles (47 Km. sq,). It is expected to serve 3 major cities of China, Tianjin, Hebei, and Beijing. Not to forget, it has been designed by the World-renowned Zaha Hadid, who was famous for her organically shaped architectural wonders.

Here are 8 Interesting Facts about the “Starfish” Airport that everyone needs to know about:

1. A Spectacular piece of Architecture, Inside Out:

West Rainbow bridge at Daxing Beijing Airport

Designed by British-Iraqi Architect famous for her organic shapes of buildings, the terminal looks like a 6-legged giant alien starfish surrounded by an endless landscape. The central atrium of the airport is supported by 8 giant C shaped columns. Each of the columns has a 106-meter wide skylight to let the daylight flow in. The departures are accompanied by 6 tradition Chinese style traditional courtyards. This combination of advanced construction styles and traditional elements makes it a beautiful piece of art.

2. World’s Largest Single Terminal Airport:

Scaled model of Daxing Beijing Airport

The Beijing Daxing International airport measures an equivalent of 97 soccer fields. There are airports in the World which measure bigger than this, however, with more than 1 terminal. It holds the record for the biggest single structure terminal in the world. As of now, only one terminal is working at the airport with only domestic flights being operated from the same.

3. The Walkable Mega-Airport:

Concourse C of Beijing Airport

One of the most important agendas of the architect’s planning was to make this huge airport completely walkable. It might be astonishing to know that it takes a maximum of 8 minutes from the security check to reach any of the 79 departure gates, thus preventing the use of shuttles and trains. The delicate design of the structure allows the aircraft to park right inside the terminal.

4. Eco-Friendly Approach Design & Construction:

Central Atrium of Daxing Airport

In order to reduce the overall ecological footprint of this huge development, the architects have inculcated a rainwater harvesting system that collects rainwater as well as purifies the water taken from the local streams and lakes. The central heating system of the airport has been designed as such to absorb the heat created from the airport operations. The heat gets reused, reducing the carbon emissions to great extents.

5. 11 Villages were demolished to make the Space for this Giant Airport:

Ariel View of the airport under construction

Over 11 villages were cleared off and demolished to construct this huge Airport. Over 20,000 people were relocated from the site because their homes were falling inside the construction site. Adequate compensations were paid, however, they did not get to have a say in the matter.

6. The Complete construction took only 5 years from scratch to finish:

The construction of this mega airport worth $64 billion took less than a total of 5 years, which is quite impressive. The first phase of construction started in 2014 and the operation has already started on September 26, 2019. It took a team of over 8000 workers to complete this whole project.

7. Qing Dynasty Tombs’ found while excavating the site for the Airport:

While excavating the construction site, the workers stuck some of the Qing Dynasty’s graveyards, their jewellery, and other relics. The Beijing Cultural Relics Bureau was call in to check out the same. Most probably, a part of the site will get protected because of the same.

8. To Become World’s busiest airport by 2040:

The platform of Daxing Airport subway station

Most probably, Daxing airport is going to become one of the biggest aviation systems throughout the world. Not only that, as per the statistics, the Beijing Daxing Airport is going to become the World’s busiest airport by 2040. It is supposed to handle around 100 million passengers annually along with 20 million tonnes of cargo by 2040.

Image courtesy:

https://commons.wikimedia.org,

https://en.wikipedia.org