Is this the world’s greatest airport? Inside Abu Dhabi’s masterpiece
This is an airport like no different – spectacular sufficient to be a vacationer attraction. So lovely it’s worthy of a postcard. So spacious it ought to maybe carry a set off warning for agoraphobics.
Which makes the expertise of being a passenger in Abu Dhabi’s new Zayed International Airport – comprising one single Terminal A – an completely surreal one.
There’s no trouble, no jostling, no common sense of despair. No one likes a delay however right here it means the possibility to gaze on the marvel of all of it. I really feel like I’ve entered a utopian futurescape.
NO EXPENSE SPARED
Terminal A price a cool $3billion (£2.4billion) to construct and opened in November to switch the previous terminals 1, 2 and three. It had been a very long time coming, with the contracts for building signed off in 2012 and the grand unveiling initially earmarked for 2017.
Now, it’s the house hub of the UAE’s nationwide airline, Etihad, with its title altering this yr from Abu Dhabi International Airport to Zayed International Airport, after the UAE’s Founding Father, the late Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan.
The way forward for air journey: Ted Thornhill takes within the glittering magnificence of Abu Dhabi’s new Zayed International Airport Terminal A. Behind him is Sana Al Nour, an enormous vase-like construction consisting of 1,632 curved translucent glass panels that stands 22m (72ft) tall and 17m (55ft) broad
Terminal A price a cool $3 billion (£2.4 billion) to construct and opened in November to switch the previous terminals 1, 2 and three. It’s the house hub of the UAE’s nationwide airline, Etihad
STATE-OF-THE-ART DESIGN
The futuristic hub has been designed by the U.S structure agency Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates (KPF), which was behind New York’s Hudson Yards advanced and Atlantis The Royal resort in Dubai.
Within seconds, earlier than reaching the check-in desks, I conclude that with Terminal A the agency has provide you with a near-perfect idea. All airports ought to be like this.
The cavernous house by the doorway is dominated by an set up referred to as ‘Sana Al Nour’ – an enormous vase-like construction consisting of 1,632 curved translucent glass panels that stands 22m (72ft) tall and 17m (55ft) broad. Not simply fairly on the attention, Sana Al Nour additionally facilitates energy-saving airflow for your complete terminal constructing, permitting for cool air to cross by way of the entrance and high of it, whereas warmth rises by way of the center.
Sana Al Nour (above) facilitates energy-saving airflow for your complete terminal constructing, permitting for cool air to cross by way of the entrance and high of it, whereas warmth rises by way of the center
I level my digicam on the arching, operatic assist pillars that attain up into the roof. Little marvel, I muse, that director Christopher McQuarrie selected Terminal A to shoot a number of the dramatic opening scenes for Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One.
HASSLE-FREE CHECK-IN AND SECURITY
Forget queuing – particularly in case you reap the benefits of the airport’s ground-breaking biometric system.
Terminal A is the one airport on the earth the place passengers can navigate by way of immigration and the check-in and boarding course of with out the necessity for bodily paperwork, due to biometric cameras positioned at strategic factors.
Ted checks in for his business-class flight with Etihad to Heathrow. He writes: ‘This is an airport like no different – spectacular sufficient to be a vacationer attraction. So lovely it’s worthy of a postcard. So spacious it ought to maybe carry a set off warning for agoraphobics’
Terminal A is the one airport on the earth the place passengers can navigate by way of immigration and the check-in and boarding course of with out the necessity for bodily paperwork, due to biometric cameras positioned at strategic factors
Christopher McQuarrie selected Terminal A to shoot a number of the dramatic opening scenes for Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One
You nonetheless must have your passport and different paperwork with you, however use facial recognition and further checks are tremendously lowered, making for an much more seamless course of.
I haven’t registered for the ‘facial recognition journey’, however I virtually float by way of to departures nonetheless.
Security is a leap ahead, too. All my liquids keep in my bag for the cutting-edge X-ray machine, overseen by shockingly well mannered employees, although my laptop computer needs to be eliminated.
AIRSIDE SHOPPING
After safety, passengers enter 35,000 sq. metres of buying heaven. Ted writes: ‘Get able to douse your bank card, as a result of a number of main designer manufacturers have arrange store, from Gucci to Yves Saint Laurent, Hermes to Ferragamo’
Budget buys are additionally out there airside. There’s a Costa Coffee, Starbucks, TGI Fridays, McDonald’s, KFC, Jones the Grocer, Camden Food Co, Meat District and a Todd English restaurant
Once by way of safety, you enter a gleaming shopper’s paradise that covers 35,000 sq. metres.
Get able to douse your bank card, as a result of a number of main designer manufacturers have arrange store, from Gucci to Yves Saint Laurent, Hermes to Ferragamo.
Budget buys are additionally out there. There’s a Costa Coffee, Starbucks, TGI Fridays, McDonald’s, KFC, Jones the Grocer, Camden Food Co, Meat District and a Todd English restaurant.
What strikes me, as I’m wondering hither and thither, is the tranquillity of all of it.
ACRES OF SPACE
The airport can deal with 45million passengers yearly, 11,000 passengers per hour and has stands for 79 plane (65 of that are related to the constructing). Terminal A covers 742,000 sq. metres (about double the dimensions of Heathrow’s Terminal 5) and has walkways virtually large enough for a Dreamliner to trundle by way of.
If you lose a liked one, there’s no want to fret – simply WhatsApp utilizing the airport’s quick, free and password-less Wi-Fi.
HEADING FOR THE GATE
The airport claims a kerb-to-gate time of 12 minutes in case you’re utilizing the biometric recognition system and you’ve got a handy departure gate. Arriving two hours earlier than your flight shouldn’t be obligatory right here.
The gates are organized alongside 4 tentacle-like arms that stretch out from a central hub to kind an X form. Each tentacle is themed otherwise, representing Abu Dhabi’s pure landscapes of desert, sea, metropolis and oasis. Luton Airport this isn’t.
LUXURIOUS LOUNGES
The world-class Etihad lounge – three flooring of wanton (complimentary) luxurious for enterprise, firstclass, and tier-status economic system passengers
LEFT: Ted checks in to the beautiful Etihad lounge. RIGHT: Ted receives a mocktail on the lounge bar
The lounge bar includes a stay cooking station, above, which serves native and worldwide dishes
My departure expertise finishes within the world-class Etihad lounge – three flooring of wanton (complimentary) luxurious for enterprise, firstclass, and tier-status economic system passengers.
There is a stay cooking station serving native and worldwide dishes, a bar worthy of a five-star resort, 18 bathe suites, video games rooms for adults and kids, and extra modish seating which you can shake a neck pillow at.
I’m given a sneak peek on the first-class space, which options inviting semi-cocooned non-public seating areas shielded by elegant curtains.
Above is the grownup video games room within the Etihad lounge. There is a kids’s video games room subsequent door
Ted is given a sneak peek on the first-class space (above), ‘which options inviting semi-cocooned non-public seating areas shielded by elegant curtains’
Some of the gates hook up with the lounge, which faces the runway, with enormous home windows affording company magnificent views of manoeuvering planes – together with A380 superjumbos. Above is the first-class lounge
The picture above reveals the overall leisure space within the Etihad first-class lounge part
The airport can deal with 45million passengers yearly, 11,000 passengers per hour and has stands for 79 plane (65 of that are related to the constructing)
Some of the gates hook up with the lounge, which faces the runway, with enormous home windows affording company magnificent views of manoeuvering planes – together with A380 superjumbos.
BOARDING THE PLANE
If you’re an Etihad lounge consumer and your flight is departing from one of many gates related to the lounge, you possibly can board instantly. Mine is. And it solely takes a few minutes to go from bar to air bridge, with beaming employees readily available to ensure I don’t take a flawed flip and find yourself in a bathe suite accidentally.
As my aircraft backs away from the airport, I love the mesmerising wavy rooftop of the airport, which mirrors the UAE’s undulating dunes.
THE VERDICT? THAT’S EASY
Singapore’s Changi Airport was named the world’s greatest on the 2023 Skytrax World Airport Awards – ‘the Oscars of the airport industry’. It was the twelfth time it had snared the gong. And given its acclaimed options, together with the world’s highest indoor waterfall and an ‘enchanted garden’, nobody was stunned.
But that was earlier than Zayed International Airport’s Terminal A burst upon the scene.
I might eat my boarding cross if this sensational Abu Dhabi challenge doesn’t safe the crown subsequent yr.
The airport’s title modified this yr from Abu Dhabi International Airport to Zayed International Airport, after the UAE’s Founding Father, the late Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan
Terminal A covers 742,000 sq. metres (about double the dimensions of Heathrow’s Terminal 5) and has walkways ‘virtually large enough for a Dreamliner to trundle by way of’
