Capital Airport will be officially opened today with a total investment of over 79.9 billion

               Graphic illustration of the new airport inthe capital. China New Network Mapping

China News Service, Beijing, December 26(Chen Yilu) The Civil Aviation Administration of China announced on the 24ththat the construction of the new airport in the capital will be officiallystarted on the 26th of this month and it is planned to be completed and putinto operation in 2019. The airport covers an area of about 1,600 acres with atotal investment of over 79.9 billion yuan. It is located between Fuzheng Town,Lixian Town, Daxing District, Beijing, and Guangyang District of Langfang City,Hebei Province. It is positioned as a large-scale international aviation hub.

"Number" reads the new airport: 7runways with annual throughput of 100 million passengers

According to the plan, the new airport willbuild 7 runways to meet the annual passenger demand of 100 million passengers.Among them, the first phase of the project is designed to build 4 runways,700,000 square meters of terminal buildings and corresponding freighttransportation according to the target of 72 million passengers throughput, 2million tons of cargo and mail throughput, and 620,000 aircraft movements in2025. , air traffic control, aviation oil, air food, municipal facilities,comprehensive transportation hubs and other production and living facilities.

The four runways in the first phase will beused for the first time with three vertical and one horizontal“omnidirectional” configurations. These runway configurations are suitable forthe air operation characteristics of the Beijing-Tianjin region and provide avariety of feasible solutions for air traffic control operations. The limiteduse of the tight airspace resources in the Beijing area to reduce aircraftground taxiing time is conducive to improving the efficiency of airspaceintegrated operation and reducing the impact on the surrounding noise.

In addition, the government also plans tobuild a “five vertical and two horizontal” integrated transportation backbonenetwork with the new airport as the core, integrating various transportationmethods such as roads, urban rail transit, high-speed railways, and inter-cityrailways, and dominated by large-capacity public transportation. The formationof a comprehensive ground transportation system with strong regional radiationcapabilities.

It is worth mentioning that the new airporttrack line can reach the central area of Beijing directly and connect with theurban rail network at multiple points; the expressway and intercity railway canconnect with the surrounding major cities within 2 hours, creating a newair-to-rail connection. With favorable conditions, the scope of service at thenew airport will be further expanded.

From the geographical point of view, thenew airport is located in the superimposed area of the planned development ofthe Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region. After the completion of the new airport,relying on the airport to develop the airport economy, it will be conducive tothe role of industrial agglomeration, make good use of the resource conditionsand industrial foundations of Hebei Province and Tianjin City, and guideBeijing’s service functions such as transportation and logistics, education andtraining, and trade and commerce markets. External relief, create a new pole ofeconomic growth, and drive the development of the surrounding areas.

Capital Airport Dilemma: It is impossibleto arrange about 300 flight schedules per day

In 2013, the passenger flow of the CapitalAirport reached 83.41 million, with daily averages of more than 1,600 flights.This year, the throughput of the Capital Airport is expected to exceed 85million passengers, ranking second in the world. However, due to the nearsaturation of airport usage, according to Zhou Laizhen, deputy director of theCivil Aviation Administration of China, about 300 flight schedules at theCapital Airport cannot be arranged every day, and the potential demand fornearly 10 million passengers per year is “rejected”. According to the analysis,if it is not rationally planned, the growth of Beijing's aviation business willbe bottleneck, so the new airport is imperative.

At the same time, as a world-class city,Tokyo has two large airports, two in Paris and five in London. As the capitalof China, Beijing currently only has one large airport. In January 2013, theState Council issued the "Project for Promoting the Development of theCivil Aviation Industry and the Key Tasks for Division of Work", statingthat "we will make Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou airports a majorinternational aviation hub with complete functions and global exposure."The construction of a new airport is an important step for Beijing to improveits large-scale international aviation hub.

Since 2008, the government has conductedcomprehensive scientific argumentation and strict comparison and selection ofthe airspace, airspace, environmental protection, terrain and geology,conditions of public facilities, and regional economic development. After sixyears of long wait, in May 2014, the Ministry of Environmental Protectionissued the “Environmental Impact Report for the Beijing New Airport Project”,and the location of the new airport in Beijing was finalized. After thecompletion of the new airport in Beijing, the straight distance from TiananmenSquare is about 46 kilometers, and the straight distance from downtown Langfangis about 26 kilometers.

Some short-haul flights to Beijing will bediverted to Tianjin

On December 22, the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebeiagreement for the development of civil aviation cooperation was signed.Passenger traffic at the Capital Airport will be diverted to Tianjin Airportand Shijiazhuang Airport in Hebei each year. Short-haul flights with distancesbelow 1,000 kilometers are encouraged to move out. As for the specific flightsthat have been evacuated, the relevant person in charge of the CAAC stated thatthere is no timetable that will be determined by the government and marketallocation.

In addition, civil aviation of the threeplaces will establish a comprehensive transit system with zero transfer andseamless connection. The Beijing-Tianjin Intercity Railway Tianjin AirportExtension Line and Beijing-Shijiazhuang Intercity Railway Shijiazhuang AirportStation will be accelerated.

After the signing of the agreement, theCapital Airport will increase the transfer capacity of the internationalaviation hub, and the transit rate for international flights will increase from25% to around 30%. At the same time, this measure will bring a lot of passengertraffic to Tianjin and Shijiazhuang Airport, and will eliminate the developmentdilemma of the three places of civil aviation: “There is no food in Beijing, nofood in Tianjin, no food in Hebei”.

The tentative name "Capital NewAirport" was once ridiculed as "Wu Grand Airport"

As a "national business card",the naming of Beijing's new airport was once a hot topic for the twoconferences in Beijing in 2014. The names of "Beijing DaxingAirport", "Beijing Langfang Airport" and "the capitalYongding Airport" have all been suggested.

During this period, economist Ma Guangyuanhad jokes on Weibo: “Hebei wants to call Langfang Airport, Beijing does notagree; Beijing wants to call Daxing Airport, Tianjin does not agree; Tianjinwants to call Wuqing Airport, Hebei does not agree. I suggest calling WuGallery Airport. The three places are included, but there is also popularity.How?

This time the construction of the newairport, Zhou Laizhen said to the outside world on the 24th, had considered theuse of "the capital Yongding International Airport", but because theparties do not agree, tentatively named "Capital New Airport."

A voice pointed out that place names belongto public resources and bear the function of “city signboards”. Therefore, thenaming of the new airport in Beijing should be far-reaching.