Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in November inaugurated Istanbul’s new international airport, the ambitious, award-winning project that has overturned Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson to become the world’s largest.
Erdogan has championed the $12 billion project to make Istanbul a global travel hub linking Europe, Asia and Africa and turn flag carrier Turkish Airlines into an aviation giant.
But the airport will only offer flights to five destinations until an expanded opening on 29 December, from when it is expected to handle up to 90 million passengers a year, rising to 200 million when all facilities are completed in 2028. That would be nearly double the number of passengers moving through the world’s current busiest airport, Hartsfield-Jackson in the US city of Atlanta.
About 35,000 people worked on the project.
A metro line will be built to link the airport, which is near the Black Sea coast on the European side of Istanbul, to the city centre 35 kilometres (22 miles) away.
When completed in 2028, the Airport will have six runways and two terminals spread over 76 square kilometres (29 square miles/76.5 million square meters). Turkish Airlines will take advantage of the extra space by expanding its commercial and cargo operations. It’s supposed to have the world’s largest terminal under one roof.
By 2019 the Turkish Airlines claimed it would add 40 airplanes to its fleet. ‘By 2023 we will have 450 planes and transport more than 120 million passengers. The airport will see 200,000 or more passengers passing through daily.
The airport’s tulip-shaped control tower and striking design had won first prize in the “Future projects — Infrastructure” category at the 2016 World Architectural Festival in Berlin.
A metro line will be built to link the airport, which is near the Black Sea coast on the European side of Istanbul, to the city centre 35 kilometres (22 miles) away.
