Changi International Airport set a new record in passenger movements last year, welcoming 62.2 million passengers. Traffic across all regions registered positive growth, with Southeast and Northeast Asia contributing to about 70%. Notable among its top 10 markets are China and India with double-digit growths of 12% and 16% respectively.
In the new year, Changi will continue to develop the long-haul segments to Europe, and strengthen connectivity to secondary cities in China and India, according to Lim Ching Kiat, managing director, air hub development of Changi Airport Group (CAG).
New passenger services
From next month, Qantas will be returning with a daily Sydney-London service via Singapore. Lufthansa German Airlines will be resuming services on the Munich-Singapore route, while LOT Polish Airlines will be launching a new link between Singapore and Warsaw in May. Come June, low-cost long-haul airline Scoot will have a new connection to Berlin.
Cementing position as Asia’s aviation hub
Last October, the long-awaited T4 opened. It is expected to handle about eight million passengers in its first year, thanks to the extensive use of technology – self-service check-ins, centralised security checks and facial recognition system – which help to boost overall capacity.
Changi’s oldest terminal, T1, which first received an upgrade in 2012, is in the midst of its second phase of expansion. Scheduled to complete by 2019, it will feature fully-automated baggage handling and a larger arrival hall and baggage claim areas.
In the same year, the Jewel mixed-use complex, which will offer shopping, dining and lifestyle attractions including a 40-metre-high Rain Vortex primed to be the world’s largest indoor waterfall, will open.
These developments will boost Changi Airport’s total handling capacity to 85 million passengers per year.
A third runway, which will be operational in the early 2020s, will help to cater to that demand.
Looking further ahead
To vie for a larger market share of Asia’s fast growing air travel market, expected to triple in the next two decades, T5 is also in the works.
When completed around 2030, it will have an estimated capacity of up to 50 million passengers per year.
While the move by CAG shows great foresight as competition heats up among airports in the region, reports on plans to increase passenger taxes to fund the construction have ruffled feathers.
The International Air Transport Association (IATA) has also repeatedly said it does not support pre-funding.
“We need to get the funding model right to avoid burdening the industry with extra costs,” said IATA director-general and CEO, Alexandre de Juniac to the Singapore Airshow Aviation Leadership Summit.