Suvarnabhumi Opening Day* Report

[Soju]

Arriving on TG 657 from ICN, minutes before touchdown a video is shown detailing the layout of Suvarnabhumi, and showing how to go through immigration, how to transfer to another international flight, how to transfer to a domestic flight, etc. A nice touch which was absent on flights into Don Muang. Also, a leaflet is passed out to all passengers showing a map of Suvarnabhumi and some information. It's the same leaflet which I downloaded a few days ago from THAI's website, but will certainly be useful for many passenger who never looked at the website before travel.

On touchdown at Suvarnabhumi at about 00:50 (about 20 minutes late due to late takeoff), I'm immediately impressed. It's dark, so there's a lot I can't see, but the blue lighting of the modern terminal building immediately catches my eye. The vast expanse of the airport, with plenty of space for runways, taxiways, etc. are in sharp contrast to the cramped spaces on Don Muang's tarmac. It certainly looks and feels just like you'd expect from any world-class modern airport opening in the 21st century. The plane quickly finds it way to the gate within only minutes - much quicker than I ever experienced at Don Muang. At the gates, I immediately notice the lack of HSBC advertising all over the place as is common on airports around Thailand and SEA. (I never could figure out why HSBC spends so much for advertising when they only have one single branch in all of Thailand, and none in many cities where they advertise at.) In place of the usual HSBC ads are signs that say "Long Live The King."

As I step out of the plane, and into the walkway towards the terminal, again lack of the usual HSBC advertsing. Then comes the steel-plate floor in a small area as you enter the terminal. I immediately get a somewhat cold feeling from the steel floor (this same steel floor is present in a couple other places in the airport.) But as soon as I begin to wonder why the choice of steel floors, it is replaced with tile and a much warmer feeling. Traversing through a series of moving walkways, all of which are working, I notice everywhere a lack of advertising, and bare concrete pillars which I assume will later be paneled or otherwise decorated. There are several places along the walkways with paintings/murals/or whatevers to liven up the place. The structure looks impressive, with the walkways being bi-level. I'm assuming the lower level is for arriving passenger and the upper level is for departing, but not really sure. I pop into a restroom to check the water supply which I heard reportedly wasn't working a couple days ago. No problems. At one point, there is a sign directing TG passengers to Chiang Rai, Phuket, etc. to go through a checkpoint (those airports can handle international passengers, so there's no need to go through immigration at BKK). But the checkpoint is closed, and the guard cannot speak much English but merely directs the passengers towards the regular immigration. The time of day could explain it being closed, but from appearances it looks like the checkpoint is still not finished. So much for the nice video explaining how to transfer.

I arrive at Thai Immigration 9 minutes after the doors of the plane were opened. I'm flying on business class on TG, so there is supposed to be a dedicated fast-track immigration lane that I can use, but I don't even bother to look for it as it's not needed - there are about a dozen empty lanes without anyone waiting. This is the first I've ever seen such a lack of immigration queues in BKK. I select one of the available immigration booths, and takes all of about 30 seconds to stamp me and send me on my way. I recall hearing it reported that it will take on average 20 seconds per passenger to process them through immigration, and they're pretty close already to that target if everyone can be processed as fast as I was. There are no cameras here like at Don Muang. Also she asks for my boarding pass - a first. I suppose they are now checking passengers against the plane's passenger manifest to speed up processing. There is no flipping through my passport, which has dozens and dozens of Thai entrance/exit stamps, and is almost completely full, including the extension. She just finds an empty page, stamps it, and I'm on my way.

Into the baggage claim area, I take a quick look around. There's lots and lots of people, which is unusual for this time of night. Though all arriving passengers are now dircted to one area rather than two separate terminals like at Don Muang, still I think this is not normal. I'm guessing that several flights were delayed, and/or luggage is being delayed arriving. I have no checked luggage, so I take a few minutes and try to locate the TG Royal Orchid Arrival Lounge as identified on the leaflet I was given during my flight. I'm unsuccessful, and locate some TG staff and ask them. The guy doesn't know, but is very friendly and goes out of his way to find someone who claims they do know. I am told to exit through customs and go to my right.

I select a "nothing to declare" exit, and go right through. Time from opening of the doors of the plane to exiting customs is now 14 minutes. I'm greeted by the ever smiling and bubbly Mrs. Soju, who is so very proud of what the Thai people have accomplished in building this modern world-class airport. A quck check outside for the TG Arrival Lounge, and it seems it does not exist. But on closer inspection of the leaflet and realizing that to the right (on your right side if you're exiting) of International Arrivals is Domestic Arrivals. I come to the conclusion that it is a domestic arrival lounge, not an international arrival lounge, so I will look for it next week when I arrive on a domestic flight.

I tell Mrs. Soju that I want to look around a bit before heading off to the city. There are lots of temporary (paper) signs guiding you to taxis, which are on the first floor. There were quite a few passengers arriving, but there is no queue to speak of for taxis. There are more taxis queued than there are passengers at this point in time. An also not so unusual case at Don Muang at this time of night. Mrs. Soju, myself, together with her sister and sister's boyfriend take his car into the city.

Having slept well on the plane, I'm not very tired and can't sleep. It's only 03:30, and our domestic flight isn't until 08:25, but I tell Mrs. Soju that I'm anxious to have a better look at the airport, which she doesn't quite understand why, but accepts and it's back to the airport we go.

I'm really surprised at the number of passengers here at the airport at 04:30. Many more than I've ever seen at Don Muang. Lots and lots of sleeping passengers as well as a good number of airport workers, wherever they can find a spot. On the public seating, in the waiting lounge, customer service lounge, coffee shops, etc. I'm guessing that if there were some significant flight delays or luggage delays that maybe a lot of passenger missed their flights/connections and had to spend the night. Or maybe they just wanted to stay at the airport and look around - I'm not sure. I suspect that a lot of workers spent the night or several nights there at the airport in trying to get it open in time and were taking a well-deserved nap before starting another day of work.

A list of impressions and details of the airport, based on last night and this morning are as follows:

Public seating is in the form of five chairs per unit, some of which are connected together to form seats of 10 or 15 per unit. So it's easy to count seats by counting the number of these 5-seat units.

Level 4 (Departure Hall) has 108x5 = 540 seats

Level 2 (Arrival) has 69x5 = 345 seats

Level 3 has 49x5 = 245 seats

Level 1 has 55x5 = 275 seats, plus plenty more outside the terminal

Total indoor public seating landside: 1405 seats

It was reported earlier that there are only 100 seats in the arrival hall, which was obviously a completely false report, or else the seating was updated since then, or installation of it wasn't yet completed when that report was made. More likely, though, I suppose, is that they counted units, not seats, thus they weren’t far off if they counted 100 and the actual number was 108, but mis-reported it as actual seats rather than seating units.

The number of toilets in the departure hall (I only checked the men's restrooms) does seem to be inadequate, but even with a good number of people there were no problems yet that I saw. With the airport running at full capacity, I don't know if there will be a problem or not. Certainly there are more toilets on the other levels, so if there was a line in one, you could always go to another level. But you might have to walk quite a distance to do so.

There are thousands and thousands of shiny new luggage carts. I've never seen so many luggage carts in my life. I don't foresee any shortage of these in the near future.

I noticed a foot massage and spa place on level 3, for those of you who have some time to kill and want a massage. It wasn't open early in the morning, but looked like it was ready.

There are plenty of Family Marts and Boots scattered around the airport. The prices seem to be the standard prices as can be found throughout Bangkok. This is good news, as at Don Muang the 7-11 or other convenience stores were not very convenient to access. There's also a Starbucks and a Black Canyon (it's a different name, but says it's run by Black Canyon). There are no Burger Kings or KFCs, at least not landside, which is a big change from Don Muang. There is a food place combined with the Black Canyon, and a few other food places on Level 3. On Level 5, there is a restaurant, but it was only serving drinks, no food as of today. On Level 1 there is a food court, serving standard Thai food. There were no farangs in here, only what looked like airport workers. But I will give it a try sometime when I'm back in the future.

The Post Office looks ready to go, but was closed early in the morning when I saw it. At Don Muang, the post office is open 24 hours, so I'm not sure if they just aren't quite ready yet to open, or if they close overnight.

There is an internet cafe which is open in the arrival hall. An earlier report said they would charge 500 Baht per hour. But I inquired about the rate and they said 100 Baht per 20 minutes. There were 14 terminals, but only one customer and three staff to man the cafe. There were phones there also, I presume for making international phone calls.

Throughout the airport I saw probably a half-dozen cherry pickers (is that what they're called? The machines to lift a person high up to be able to access things high up above the floor). Also a number of workers trying to finish up work that should have already been done but wasn't. It wasn't very obstructive, but was noticeable. Again, this was at night, so I don't know if they will still be there during the day. Early reports about the tiles mentioned that in many places there was a lack of grouting. But now it seems that all the grouting is complete, though in several places it looks like a very rushed and sloppy job was done. Lot's of retail and offices have not yet opened. Many of them look to be well along, but some are still only empty shells. For the most part, the actual airport facilities seem to be almost all completed and functioning. The overall state of completion is much higher than what I was expecting.

Signage is a problem. There's a lot that I could say about this, but don't really have time now to just say that it really seems to me to be inadequate. One interesting thing is that there are signs all over directing you to arrivals, departures, buses, etc, and included in those signs is the rail link which isn't yet finished. So all the directions to the rail link have been taped over.

The employees at the airport were all very friendly. And no touts (knock on wood). I was approached several times by employees asking if they could help me. I guess looking around at everything made them think I was lost.

Lots and lots of people taking pictures, wanting to record a moment in history - the opening of the new airport.

The arrival area (after you exit customs) is too narrow and very crowded. It is plenty wide, but needs to be much deeper. There isn't enough space for all the people waiting for arriving passengers to greet them and it makes it difficult for arriving passenger to navigate the sea of people. This is a common problem at airports around the world, but I think they need to figure out something to improve on the situation here. It's too late now to redesign it and make the area deeper, but maybe they can rope off areas to allow arriving passengers clear passage.

There are moving walkways to take you from one level to the next. This is a big improvement over having to use elevators if you have a cart full of luggage as the elevators often are full and it can take a long time to wait for one just to go up or down a level. As with all moving walkways, they are not very speedy, so if you don't have a cart with you, the escalators will be faster.

Something that could be of significant importance to a lot of people, but that I've yet to see anyone mention - Only TMB and SCB have exchange booths and ATMs at the new airport. If you need to use a Bangkok Bank, or any other bank's ATM, you cannot do it at the airport. I think this is a mistake, but probably they paid some fee to be able to get exclusive access at the airport.

The air conditioning is certainly adequate. The temperature on level 4 (departures) is the coolest, but all levels are certainly as good or better than Don Muang. This was at night, when the outside temperature was a bit cooler, so I don't know if the same will be true on hot days. Inside a few of the shops, the temperature was a bit on the warm side.

There are plenty of booths for you to pay the departure tax for international flights, but no machines as of yet. I suppose it's not a priority to get those machines transferred from Don Muang. Almost all the booths were manned, even at 04:30 without hardly any departing passengers. I heard reported earlier that they were not collecting the departure tax, but it appears that they are as of today.

It was reported that THAI will stop their complementary limousine service because they are not allowed access to the curbside anymore. I asked the counter girl at domestic check-in about this, and she said they still had the service, and you could go to the Thai Limousine counter on level 1 to enquire more. I didn't have time, but I will check more on this next time I'm through the airport.

I asked at customer service about Star Alliance Gold members using either the Royal Silk Lounges or the Royal Orchid Lounges and she said we could use either. From the THAI leaflet, it wasn't clear if those members might be excluded from the Royal Silk Lounges.

Ok, back to my trip report. I arrive at domestic check-in at a little after 05:00, because I want to get to the lounge to write this trip report and post it. But I'm surprised to see long lines at all the check-in counters, and on top of it all 15 or so of them say "economy". I'm flying business class, so I'm a bit upset that I paid good money, just to be lumped together with economy-class passengers. I mention this to one of the TG staff, and a minute later two of the lanes are changed from "Economy" to "Royal Silk", but already the damage is done as there are probably 20 people in those lines, most of whom are economy passengers and nobody asks them to move to another line. Oh well, mai pen rai, I expected problems on opening day and can't complain too much. The check-in is very slow. It seems to be computerized, but I'm guessing the staff isn't up to speed yet on how to use it, or the system is overloaded, or something is holding up the process. I ask about the Thai business class lounge for domestic passengers, but I'm directed by the check-in girl to the "Royal Silk Waiting Lounge" just opposite of the Row A check-in. It is full of all sorts of people just sleeping, and no checks are being made to verify that only Royal Silk passengers are allowed in. A bit of a disappointment, so I check next door at Customer Service, and they inform me that business class passengers are free to use the Royal Silk Lounge near the departure gates.

So I go to the Royal Silk Lounge and find a nicely decorated room. They have just basic snacks and beverage, and the seats are not nearly as comfortable as many other lounges I've been in, but overall it's ok for a domestic lounge. There are four computers, one of which I'm using to type this report. But unfortunately the internet isn't working yet. The girl said maybe by tomorrow. So I'll have to post this report a bit later after I arrive at my final destination. She told me that the lounge is available to all Royal Silk passengers plus all Star Alliance Gold Card members traveling in economy.

Ok, I’ve now arrived at my destination. Just to add, for any of you traveling with Bangkok Airways, they have a new domestic lounge just beyond THAI’s. I didn’t go inside, but could see through the glass and I prefer the decoration in the THAI lounge.

Pushback from the gate was delayed 20 minutes due to it taking excessive time to load the baggage (likely there was some delays in getting the baggage to the plane). After pushback, the plane just goes forward a bit and you’re right there on the runway ready for takeoff. Total time from disconnecting the tow to being in the air was maybe 3 minutes. Nice! Very nice indeed!

There are lots of empty gates at Suvarnabhumi. There should be no more need for remote parking and using the buses, unless the LCCs don’t want to pay for direct gate access. Even Nok Air had a bird at the gate. A first that I’ve seen.

Overall, I'm very impressed with Suvarnabhumi. Of course there are some problems as everyone expected there would be. But I've seen nothing to suggest massive problems on the scale that some naysayers were predicting. Someone I overheard at check-in was saying that 24 hours ago the place was much busier than today. I certainly wouldn't be surprised if there still aren't major problems that crop up. Lots of staff still don't know a lot about the new airport and everyone should allow plenty of extra time during the next few weeks. But to all the people who went into making Suvarnabhumi happen, I say "good job! I’m impressed”.

*Opening Day meaning 24 hour period from official opening, not calendar day

[Old Man River]

I don't know if this first happened yesterday, but I first noticed it yesterday:

If you drive on the Motorway past Srinakarin on the way to the new airport you will see a large blue sign overhead that reads Suvarnabhumi Airport 14 KM. Just past this sign is the normal green road marker at 2 KM. The next big blue sign you see for the airport says 10 KM. This sign is posted just in front of 4 KM marker. Obviously, in a rush to put the signs up for the new airport, somebody missed it by 2 KM. While I have no doubt that any issues at the new airport will be fixed soon, I wonder if they will ever move the new airport's 10 KM sign back to the 6 KM marker where it should be.

[WNOVAK]

Finally an in depth personal report of the new airport.

THANK-YOU!!!!

Could not understand after following this ( and several other) sites that it took so long for a hands-on report(of any kind) but especially an experienced traveller.

Looking forward to the arrival experience on a personal basis but appears nothing to be too afraid of.

GREAT REPORT much appreciated

[Maestro]

Thank you, Soju, for your detailed report. This should ease the minds of a lot of members who were apprehensive about leaving from or arriving at Suvarnabhumi.

Your report shows that some finishing touches and other improvements have already been made since we had the arrival report of Thaiflyer1 three days ago.

--------------

Maestro

[bkkandrew]

Arriving on TG 657 from ICN, minutes before touchdown a video is shown detailing the layout of Suvarnabhumi, and showing how to go through immigration, how to transfer to another international flight, how to transfer to a domestic flight, etc. A nice touch which was absent on flights into Don Muang. Also, a leaflet is passed out to all passengers showing a map of Suvarnabhumi and some information. It's the same leaflet which I downloaded a few days ago from THAI's website, but will certainly be useful for many passenger who never looked at the website before travel.

On touchdown at Suvarnabhumi at about 00:50 (about 20 minutes late due to late takeoff), I'm immediately impressed. It's dark, so there's a lot I can't see, but the blue lighting of the modern terminal building immediately catches my eye. The vast expanse of the airport, with plenty of space for runways, taxiways, etc. are in sharp contrast to the cramped spaces on Don Muang's tarmac. It certainly looks and feels just like you'd expect from any world-class modern airport opening in the 21st century. The plane quickly finds it way to the gate within only minutes - much quicker than I ever experienced at Don Muang. At the gates, I immediately notice the lack of HSBC advertising all over the place as is common on airports around Thailand and SEA. (I never could figure out why HSBC spends so much for advertising when they only have one single branch in all of Thailand, and none in many cities where they advertise at.) In place of the usual HSBC ads are signs that say "Long Live The King."

As I step out of the plane, and into the walkway towards the terminal, again lack of the usual HSBC advertsing. Then comes the steel-plate floor in a small area as you enter the terminal. I immediately get a somewhat cold feeling from the steel floor (this same steel floor is present in a couple other places in the airport.) But as soon as I begin to wonder why the choice of steel floors, it is replaced with tile and a much warmer feeling. Traversing through a series of moving walkways, all of which are working, I notice everywhere a lack of advertising, and bare concrete pillars which I assume will later be paneled or otherwise decorated. There are several places along the walkways with paintings/murals/or whatevers to liven up the place. The structure looks impressive, with the walkways being bi-level. I'm assuming the lower level is for arriving passenger and the upper level is for departing, but not really sure. I pop into a restroom to check the water supply which I heard reportedly wasn't working a couple days ago. No problems. At one point, there is a sign directing TG passengers to Chiang Rai, Phuket, etc. to go through a checkpoint (those airports can handle international passengers, so there's no need to go through immigration at BKK). But the checkpoint is closed, and the guard cannot speak much English but merely directs the passengers towards the regular immigration. The time of day could explain it being closed, but from appearances it looks like the checkpoint is still not finished. So much for the nice video explaining how to transfer.

I arrive at Thai Immigration 9 minutes after the doors of the plane were opened. I'm flying on business class on TG, so there is supposed to be a dedicated fast-track immigration lane that I can use, but I don't even bother to look for it as it's not needed - there are about a dozen empty lanes without anyone waiting. This is the first I've ever seen such a lack of immigration queues in BKK. I select one of the available immigration booths, and takes all of about 30 seconds to stamp me and send me on my way. I recall hearing it reported that it will take on average 20 seconds per passenger to process them through immigration, and they're pretty close already to that target if everyone can be processed as fast as I was. There are no cameras here like at Don Muang. Also she asks for my boarding pass - a first. I suppose they are now checking passengers against the plane's passenger manifest to speed up processing. There is no flipping through my passport, which has dozens and dozens of Thai entrance/exit stamps, and is almost completely full, including the extension. She just finds an empty page, stamps it, and I'm on my way.

Into the baggage claim area, I take a quick look around. There's lots and lots of people, which is unusual for this time of night. Though all arriving passengers are now dircted to one area rather than two separate terminals like at Don Muang, still I think this is not normal. I'm guessing that several flights were delayed, and/or luggage is being delayed arriving. I have no checked luggage, so I take a few minutes and try to locate the TG Royal Orchid Arrival Lounge as identified on the leaflet I was given during my flight. I'm unsuccessful, and locate some TG staff and ask them. The guy doesn't know, but is very friendly and goes out of his way to find someone who claims they do know. I am told to exit through customs and go to my right.

I select a "nothing to declare" exit, and go right through. Time from opening of the doors of the plane to exiting customs is now 14 minutes. I'm greeted by the ever smiling and bubbly Mrs. Soju, who is so very proud of what the Thai people have accomplished in building this modern world-class airport. A quck check outside for the TG Arrival Lounge, and it seems it does not exist. But on closer inspection of the leaflet and realizing that to the right (on your right side if you're exiting) of International Arrivals is Domestic Arrivals. I come to the conclusion that it is a domestic arrival lounge, not an international arrival lounge, so I will look for it next week when I arrive on a domestic flight.

I tell Mrs. Soju that I want to look around a bit before heading off to the city. There are lots of temporary (paper) signs guiding you to taxis, which are on the first floor. There were quite a few passengers arriving, but there is no queue to speak of for taxis. There are more taxis queued than there are passengers at this point in time. An also not so unusual case at Don Muang at this time of night. Mrs. Soju, myself, together with her sister and sister's boyfriend take his car into the city.

Having slept well on the plane, I'm not very tired and can't sleep. It's only 03:30, and our domestic flight isn't until 08:25, but I tell Mrs. Soju that I'm anxious to have a better look at the airport, which she doesn't quite understand why, but accepts and it's back to the airport we go.

I'm really surprised at the number of passengers here at the airport at 04:30. Many more than I've ever seen at Don Muang. Lots and lots of sleeping passengers as well as a good number of airport workers, wherever they can find a spot. On the public seating, in the waiting lounge, customer service lounge, coffee shops, etc. I'm guessing that if there were some significant flight delays or luggage delays that maybe a lot of passenger missed their flights/connections and had to spend the night. Or maybe they just wanted to stay at the airport and look around - I'm not sure. I suspect that a lot of workers spent the night or several nights there at the airport in trying to get it open in time and were taking a well-deserved nap before starting another day of work.

A list of impressions and details of the airport, based on last night and this morning are as follows:

Public seating is in the form of five chairs per unit, some of which are connected together to form seats of 10 or 15 per unit. So it's easy to count seats by counting the number of these 5-seat units.

Level 4 (Departure Hall) has 108x5 = 540 seats

Level 2 (Arrival) has 69x5 = 345 seats

Level 3 has 49x5 = 245 seats

Level 1 has 55x5 = 275 seats, plus plenty more outside the terminal

Total indoor public seating landside: 1405 seats

It was reported earlier that there are only 100 seats in the arrival hall, which was obviously a completely false report, or else the seating was updated since then, or installation of it wasn't yet completed when that report was made. More likely, though, I suppose, is that they counted units, not seats, thus they weren’t far off if they counted 100 and the actual number was 108, but mis-reported it as actual seats rather than seating units.

The number of toilets in the departure hall (I only checked the men's restrooms) does seem to be inadequate, but even with a good number of people there were no problems yet that I saw. With the airport running at full capacity, I don't know if there will be a problem or not. Certainly there are more toilets on the other levels, so if there was a line in one, you could always go to another level. But you might have to walk quite a distance to do so.

There are thousands and thousands of shiny new luggage carts. I've never seen so many luggage carts in my life. I don't foresee any shortage of these in the near future.

I noticed a foot massage and spa place on level 3, for those of you who have some time to kill and want a massage. It wasn't open early in the morning, but looked like it was ready.

There are plenty of Family Marts and Boots scattered around the airport. The prices seem to be the standard prices as can be found throughout Bangkok. This is good news, as at Don Muang the 7-11 or other convenience stores were not very convenient to access. There's also a Starbucks and a Black Canyon (it's a different name, but says it's run by Black Canyon). There are no Burger Kings or KFCs, at least not landside, which is a big change from Don Muang. There is a food place combined with the Black Canyon, and a few other food places on Level 3. On Level 5, there is a restaurant, but it was only serving drinks, no food as of today. On Level 1 there is a food court, serving standard Thai food. There were no farangs in here, only what looked like airport workers. But I will give it a try sometime when I'm back in the future.

The Post Office looks ready to go, but was closed early in the morning when I saw it. At Don Muang, the post office is open 24 hours, so I'm not sure if they just aren't quite ready yet to open, or if they close overnight.

There is an internet cafe which is open in the arrival hall. An earlier report said they would charge 500 Baht per hour. But I inquired about the rate and they said 100 Baht per 20 minutes. There were 14 terminals, but only one customer and three staff to man the cafe. There were phones there also, I presume for making international phone calls.

Throughout the airport I saw probably a half-dozen cherry pickers (is that what they're called? The machines to lift a person high up to be able to access things high up above the floor). Also a number of workers trying to finish up work that should have already been done but wasn't. It wasn't very obstructive, but was noticeable. Again, this was at night, so I don't know if they will still be there during the day. Early reports about the tiles mentioned that in many places there was a lack of grouting. But now it seems that all the grouting is complete, though in several places it looks like a very rushed and sloppy job was done. Lot's of retail and offices have not yet opened. Many of them look to be well along, but some are still only empty shells. For the most part, the actual airport facilities seem to be almost all completed and functioning. The overall state of completion is much higher than what I was expecting.

Signage is a problem. There's a lot that I could say about this, but don't really have time now to just say that it really seems to me to be inadequate. One interesting thing is that there are signs all over directing you to arrivals, departures, buses, etc, and included in those signs is the rail link which isn't yet finished. So all the directions to the rail link have been taped over.

The employees at the airport were all very friendly. And no touts (knock on wood). I was approached several times by employees asking if they could help me. I guess looking around at everything made them think I was lost.

Lots and lots of people taking pictures, wanting to record a moment in history - the opening of the new airport.

The arrival area (after you exit customs) is too narrow and very crowded. It is plenty wide, but needs to be much deeper. There isn't enough space for all the people waiting for arriving passengers to greet them and it makes it difficult for arriving passenger to navigate the sea of people. This is a common problem at airports around the world, but I think they need to figure out something to improve on the situation here. It's too late now to redesign it and make the area deeper, but maybe they can rope off areas to allow arriving passengers clear passage.

There are moving walkways to take you from one level to the next. This is a big improvement over having to use elevators if you have a cart full of luggage as the elevators often are full and it can take a long time to wait for one just to go up or down a level. As with all moving walkways, they are not very speedy, so if you don't have a cart with you, the escalators will be faster.

Something that could be of significant importance to a lot of people, but that I've yet to see anyone mention - Only TMB and SCB have exchange booths and ATMs at the new airport. If you need to use a Bangkok Bank, or any other bank's ATM, you cannot do it at the airport. I think this is a mistake, but probably they paid some fee to be able to get exclusive access at the airport.

The air conditioning is certainly adequate. The temperature on level 4 (departures) is the coolest, but all levels are certainly as good or better than Don Muang. This was at night, when the outside temperature was a bit cooler, so I don't know if the same will be true on hot days. Inside a few of the shops, the temperature was a bit on the warm side.

There are plenty of booths for you to pay the departure tax for international flights, but no machines as of yet. I suppose it's not a priority to get those machines transferred from Don Muang. Almost all the booths were manned, even at 04:30 without hardly any departing passengers. I heard reported earlier that they were not collecting the departure tax, but it appears that they are as of today.

It was reported that THAI will stop their complementary limousine service because they are not allowed access to the curbside anymore. I asked the counter girl at domestic check-in about this, and she said they still had the service, and you could go to the Thai Limousine counter on level 1 to enquire more. I didn't have time, but I will check more on this next time I'm through the airport.

I asked at customer service about Star Alliance Gold members using either the Royal Silk Lounges or the Royal Orchid Lounges and she said we could use either. From the THAI leaflet, it wasn't clear if those members might be excluded from the Royal Silk Lounges.

Ok, back to my trip report. I arrive at domestic check-in at a little after 05:00, because I want to get to the lounge to write this trip report and post it. But I'm surprised to see long lines at all the check-in counters, and on top of it all 15 or so of them say "economy". I'm flying business class, so I'm a bit upset that I paid good money, just to be lumped together with economy-class passengers. I mention this to one of the TG staff, and a minute later two of the lanes are changed from "Economy" to "Royal Silk", but already the damage is done as there are probably 20 people in those lines, most of whom are economy passengers and nobody asks them to move to another line. Oh well, mai pen rai, I expected problems on opening day and can't complain too much. The check-in is very slow. It seems to be computerized, but I'm guessing the staff isn't up to speed yet on how to use it, or the system is overloaded, or something is holding up the process. I ask about the Thai business class lounge for domestic passengers, but I'm directed by the check-in girl to the "Royal Silk Waiting Lounge" just opposite of the Row A check-in. It is full of all sorts of people just sleeping, and no checks are being made to verify that only Royal Silk passengers are allowed in. A bit of a disappointment, so I check next door at Customer Service, and they inform me that business class passengers are free to use the Royal Silk Lounge near the departure gates.

So I go to the Royal Silk Lounge and find a nicely decorated room. They have just basic snacks and beverage, and the seats are not nearly as comfortable as many other lounges I've been in, but overall it's ok for a domestic lounge. There are four computers, one of which I'm using to type this report. But unfortunately the internet isn't working yet. The girl said maybe by tomorrow. So I'll have to post this report a bit later after I arrive at my final destination. She told me that the lounge is available to all Royal Silk passengers plus all Star Alliance Gold Card members traveling in economy.

Ok, I’ve now arrived at my destination. Just to add, for any of you traveling with Bangkok Airways, they have a new domestic lounge just beyond THAI’s. I didn’t go inside, but could see through the glass and I prefer the decoration in the THAI lounge.

Pushback from the gate was delayed 20 minutes due to it taking excessive time to load the baggage (likely there was some delays in getting the baggage to the plane). After pushback, the plane just goes forward a bit and you’re right there on the runway ready for takeoff. Total time from disconnecting the tow to being in the air was maybe 3 minutes. Nice! Very nice indeed!

There are lots of empty gates at Suvarnabhumi. There should be no more need for remote parking and using the buses, unless the LCCs don’t want to pay for direct gate access. Even Nok Air had a bird at the gate. A first that I’ve seen.

Overall, I'm very impressed with Suvarnabhumi. Of course there are some problems as everyone expected there would be. But I've seen nothing to suggest massive problems on the scale that some naysayers were predicting. Someone I overheard at check-in was saying that 24 hours ago the place was much busier than today. I certainly wouldn't be surprised if there still aren't major problems that crop up. Lots of staff still don't know a lot about the new airport and everyone should allow plenty of extra time during the next few weeks. But to all the people who went into making Suvarnabhumi happen, I say "good job! I’m impressed”.

*Opening Day meaning 24 hour period from official opening, not calendar day

Great report. Thank you so much for your time and effore!

[bkkandrew]

Sorry - effort...

[pete_r]

Regarding internet access at Suvarnabhumi, I spotted a few stand-alone stations among the public payphones, announcing 50 satangs per minute, which works out to 30 bahts per hour. They are the same style as Heathrow, heavy duty stainless steel with a ball instead of a mouse.

Note that I haven't tried them, so don't know if they offer only limited service or poor connection or if they charge a higher price than announced.

I also seem to remember a report saying that the international departure tax would increase to 700 Bahts. This hasn't happened yet, as my friend paid the regular 500 Bahts this morning.

[Soju]

Regarding internet access at Suvarnabhumi, I spotted a few stand-alone stations among the public payphones, announcing 50 satangs per minute, which works out to 30 bahts per hour. They are the same style as Heathrow, heavy duty stainless steel with a ball instead of a mouse.

Note that I haven't tried them, so don't know if they offer only limited service or poor connection or if they charge a higher price than announced.

I also seem to remember a report saying that the international departure tax would increase to 700 Bahts. This hasn't happened yet, as my friend paid the regular 500 Bahts this morning.

Yes, I saw those too. About half of them weren't working yet. All of them are stand-alone without any seating. Standing while bent over a screen and trying to type on a touch-screen is not my idea of internet access. Maybe will be okay for some, but I'll give it a miss unless in very dire needs and there are no other options. I'm much prefer even to pay 300 THB per hour for a regular computer than to use one of those standing touch-screens even if they were free. Like you, I didn't try them. What do you do if you don't have a pocket full of coins? I didn't see any bill changers around.

It was announced recently that the increase to 700 THB will be early next year, February I believe. All international airports in Thailand will raise the price at that time, not just Suvarnabhumi.