Located south of today’s passenger facilities, the new Terminal 3 at Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport will finally equip the gateway with a state-of-the-art complex befitting the Indian capital.
The complex, which will serve as the airport’s new showpiece international terminal, is scheduled to open a few months before Delhi hosts the Commonwealth Games in 2010.
It is the key project of the airport’s $1.2 billion redevelopment programme and, perhaps not surprisingly, the company responsible for the terminal’s design, HOK Architects, is promising the delivery of a world-class facility.
HOK senior associate, Nicola Morton, enthuses: “The design for the new terminal is both modern and striking. It will help secure Delhi’s position on the world stage, reflect the country’s dynamic aspirations and strengthen the city’s position as a major cultural and commercial hub.”
In practical terms, the 450,000sqm terminal will more than double the gateway’s capacity from today’s 15mppa to 37mppa, and with future expansion and the addition of other new facilities could ultimately ensure that the airport is capable of handling up to 100mppa.
A potential capacity of 100 million passengers per annum would certainly make Indira Gandhi International Airport one of the biggest airports in Asia.
The A380-friendly terminal will have separate levels for handling departing and arriving passengers and boast up to 75 airbridges, 160 check-in desks and 30 remote parking bays.
Key to the design is easy pedestrian access and flow with simple and direct access to all gates.
A further design consideration was to ensure an “enhanced passenger experience” by creating a large bright central open space designed to be both striking and dynamic for all visitors to the airport.
As a result, Terminal 3 will have a large open atrium that HOK firmly believes will provide a memorable experience for both arriving and departing passengers.
Says Morton: “Very early on in the project, the design team decided to create a memorable space for arriving passengers as typically they are the ones that miss out on the views at airports.
“Let me explain. When you depart from an airport, your experience is usually very pleasant – a large bright departure lounge with extensive retail and panoramic views of the airfield and aircraft. However, when you arrive, you are generally directed straight through to baggage reclaim and then to the landside concourse.
“At Delhi T3 passengers will experience a terminal that maximises the use of natural light and gives a feeling of openness for all passengers regardless of where they are in the building. We hope that the arrivals space in particular will provide a memorable welcome to India.”
The sense of space will be further enhanced by a distinct roof that is specifically designed to maximise the amount of light filtered in to the building at the same time as helping control inside temperatures. Roof materials will also contribute significantly to the reduction of heat gain while north facing glazing minimises solar gain. They will be supported by local air handling units and automatic building management systems that will ensure the appropriate level of environmental control.
Explains Morton: “The roof essentially folds in different directions allowing light to penetrate into the building. At the same time we had to prevent unwanted sunlight that would increase the thermal gain and amplify the pressure on the terminal’s cooling system. The ‘folded roof’ concept is quite unusual as many airports still tend to use an aerofoil roof design. However this concept gave us the quality of light and space we were looking for.”
The airport’s master plan developed by Mott MacDonald required that the design of T3 incorporated swing gates that could be used for either international or domestic arrivals/departures. The concept enabled the design team to minimise the number of gates needed while maximising the number of aircraft that can use the airport.
Terminal 3 will also be different as the building is set to provide an “unusually generous” amount of sheltered areas for passengers outside both the check-in hall and the arrivals concourse.
This is in response to the large number of well-wishers and meeters and greeters that visit Indira Gandhi International Airport and indeed all other major gateways in India.
Delhi’s new state-of-the-art terminal is being designed to accommodate a high proportion of retail outlets, the majority of which will be concentrated in the departures lounge and at a large retail village planned for the facility’s forecourt.
The airport’s new terminal will also have a small transit hotel capable of accommodating up to 60 guests.
Security has not been forgotten in the building’s design as T3 will have a large central security checkpoint after check-in and another one located at the entrance to the main concourse.
The terminal’s reinforced concrete base and lightweight steel frame structure supporting a modular steel roof is designed to withstand seismic shock.
Terminal 3 will have its own high-speed metro link that makes it possible to reach downtown Delhi within half an hour. It will also be served by new road infrastructure to help ease traffic congestion.
All foreign legacy carriers serving Delhi will relocate to the terminal when it opens in 2010. They include Air France, British Airways, Lufthansa, Singapore Airlines, Etihad and Emirates. Air India will also operate out of the showpiece facility.
HOK has considerable experience in airport planning and design projects around the world that include Indianapolis International Airport’s soon-to-be completed $1 billion Midfield Terminal and the expansion of Bahrain International Airport.
In partnership with Jacobs, HOK also designed the newlyopened terminal at Cork International Airport and was responsible for the transport interchange at London Heathrow’s €5.5 billion Terminal 5. It counts Boston Logan, Honolulu and Washington Dulles among its US clients.
In addition to HOK, other companies involved in the T3 project include Mott MacDonald as lead consultant responsible for the airport’s overall master plan and engineering, and Pell Frischmann, which is part of the team providing engineering and cost consultancy.
HOK, responsible for providing architectural design and planning for the terminal and a number of support buildings, took less than a year to complete its work allowing for construction of T3 to start in early 2007.
It will be built in two phases over 39 months in readiness for completion in March 2010, the carefully timed schedule is designed to ensure the minimum of disruption to passengers and aircraft operations.
Other major projects of Delhi’s ongoing $1.2 billion master plan include the renovation and expansion of the airport’s existing terminals and the construction of a new runway, cargo centre and general aviation facility.
Support infrastructure will include the construction of a new car park, additional fire rescue stations, a crisis management centre and an airport maintenance hub.
“The sense of excitement about this project in Delhi has become quite infectious,” enthuses Morton. “Delhi’s thriving community wants their city to become a destination of choice for the international business community and sees the renovation and expansion of its airport as a major factor in helping to propel Delhi onto the world stage.”
IT partner
India’s airports appear to have found themselves an IT partner in UFIS Airport Solutions (UFIS-AS), which has successfully worked on key projects at Delhi International Airport and the newly opened gateways at Bangalore and Hyderabad.
UFIS-AS and partner, Siemens Information Systems Limited (SISL), have delivered a host of IT solutions to the airports ranging from system integration services to the provision of airport databases and FIDS and apron management systems.
In the case of Delhi, its work projects included introduction of WebFIDS, an HTML flight information display system that allows data to be managed from both central locations at the airport or from remote locations by PCs running Windows or Linux as the display controller.
An add-on to the installation in Bangalore was a link between the Airport Operational Database (AODB) and the airport’s web portal, providing up-to-the-minute flight information to the website.
“We are very happy to be moving into India as it is one of the world’s fastest growing markets,” enthuses UFIS-AS’s president and CEO Anders Sagadin. “We are confident that our state-of-the-art IT solutions and services will help ensure the future growth of India’s airport business and overall economy.”
India’s airports appear to have found themselves an IT partner in UFIS Airport Solutions (UFIS-AS), which has successfully worked on key projects at Delhi International Airport and the newly opened gateways at Bangalore and Hyderabad.
UFIS-AS and partner, Siemens Information Systems Limited (SISL), have delivered a host of IT solutions to the airports ranging from system integration services to the provision of airport databases and FIDS and apron management systems.
In the case of Delhi, its work projects included introduction of WebFIDS, an HTML flight information display system that allows data to be managed from both central locations at the airport or from remote locations by PCs running Windows or Linux as the display controller.
An add-on to the installation in Bangalore was a link between the Airport Operational Database (AODB) and the airport’s web portal, providing up-to-the-minute flight information to the website.
“We are very happy to be moving into India as it is one of the world’s fastest growing markets,” enthuses UFIS-AS’s president and CEO Anders Sagadin. “We are confident that our state-of-the-art IT solutions and services will help ensure the future growth of India’s airport business and overall economy.”
Asia-Pacific Airports 2008 Issue 2
