Expansive check-in hall at Frankfurt Airport’s new Terminal 3. (Image: Fraport)
As air travel keeps growing, airports must expand to keep pace with the traffic. The most recent new airport designs include Germany’s Frankfurt Airport which this month started construction on a new Terminal 3; Salt Lake City released renderings of the ongoing massive overhaul of its airport; and Portland will add a new wing to one of its terminals.
Frankfurt
Exterior of Frankfurt’s Terminal 3. (Image: Fraport)
Marketplace at Frankfurt’s new Terminal 3. (Image: Fraport)
Officials in Germany this month held a groundbreaking ceremony marking the start of construction on Frankfurt Airport’s big Terminal 3 complex — a project that will take years to complete. The first phase of construction, which won’t be finished until 2022, includes the main terminal building and two piers of aircraft gates (designated Piers H and J) that can handle up to 14 million passengers a year. (Officials of Fraport, the airport’s owning company, noted that the passenger capacity of the existing terminals 1 and 2 will soon be exceeded due to continuing traffic growth.) In the future, the airport will be able to add another two piers to increase T3’s capacity to 25 million passengers. The new facility will be linked to the existing terminals with a new SkyLine people-mover system.
Salt Lake City
Rendering of central plaza in Salt Lake City Airport’s new terminal. (Image: HOK Architects)
Salt Lake City’s new terminal will have plenty of huge windows. (Image: HOK Architects)
Sweeping roadway approaches to Salt Lake City’s new terminal. (Image: HOK Architects)
The firms handling design and construction of the new terminal at Salt Lake City International Airport have released renderings of what the finished project will look like. Preliminary work started last year, and the terminal won’t be finished until 2020. The three existing terminal buildings will be consolidated into a $1.8 billion, three-story terminal building and 4,000-foot-long linear concourse will include 75 new gates, moving walkways, and new shopping, dining and parking areas.
Check out a video fly-through of the new terminal here.
Portland
External view of Portland Airport’s Concourse E expansion. (Image: Portland Airport)
In January 2016, Portland International Airport in Oregon will begin work on a $98 million, 44,000 square foot expansion of Concourse E on the north side of the terminal, adding new gates and food-and-beverage outlets. When it’s finished, Alaska Airlines will move from concourse space south of the terminal to the newly expanded north side, and United will do the reverse. In the months ahead, Portland will also redesign its security checkpoints, and overhaul the ticket lobby and baggage claim areas.
Interior space at Portland’s expanded Concourse E. (Image: Portland Airport)
What do you think is the most beautiful airport in the world? Why do you think so? Please leave your comments below.
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FRA could have saved a lot of money by using IM Pei’s blueprints from the Sundrome… That being said, it looks pretty cool.
Vancouver, BC’s airport is beautiful with the backdrop of the Canadian Rockies to the East and the Sunset to the west. Much improved over the old terminal from long ago. Best on the West Coast of North America. Portland is very nice as well right on the Columbia River, lots of room and pleasant places to just hang while waiting. SFO aka the Winchester Mystery Airport has a beautiful T2, and the rest will modernize or get touch ups over the next 8 years.
I’m a big fan of Eero Saarinen, and I always thought the TWA terminal at JFK and Washington Dulles (as it originally was built, not the horror it is now) were spectacular. Munich and Denver are nice, and I’ve heard the beauty of the Seoul airport makes your jaw drop.
Frankfurt has to be the ugliest airport I have ever seen. It has all the charm and elegance of a big Costco on the Saturday before Thanksgiving. Good luck to them with the new terminal… hope it goes better than the new Berlin Brandenburg airport, which was supposed to open in 2010. Last I heard, it might open in 2018. But it’s very beautiful.