The 10 Best Airports

[NALAK]

god only knows how Zurich got in there at number 6. one of the most boring, airports i have ever had mis-furtune to visit.

Dubai has to be up there surely

Edited March 27, 2010 by NALAK

[smokie36]

OK Let's consider the ten WORST airports in the World.

I nominate the self-styled World's busiest, that hel_l hole of a place called Heathrow. Dirty, ugly, busy, expensive, unfriendly. Need I add more. It is like being at a soccer game as far as crowding goes. Although, to be fair, I have not used the new terminal (5) but I have heard that it is something else. Think of it. Five terminals, all on a par size-wise, with Swampy.

I wouldn't go that far mate. LHR would be one hel_l of an airport if each of the 5 terminals were the size of soo-wanna-poom!!

Maybe yes. But none is much smaller and I know nothing about 5.

My real gripe was that the place is always so busy. Whatever terminal.

I can only imagine you haven't spent much time in the departure lounge at Terminal 3. Every time I pass through I meet the happiest group of people in the UK.

[chimsa]

Yes, because they are departing!

[Rinrada]

Although, to be fair, I have not used the new terminal (5) but I have heard that it is something else. Think of it. Five terminals, all on a par size-wise, with Swampy.

Used Term 5 a couple of weeks ago.. BA flight to the Dam and it was OK.

Better that the other 4 humdingers but nowhere near Suwanna standards.

Get the rail link on line and then lets see wot the score is

[chuenyongman]

I mostly agree with that list. BKK is a very good airport that has a few flaws. When the Rail link is finished, the airport might even move up a couple of notches. BKK sure beats any U.S airport, especially LAX.

Bkk is a nightmare airport full of scams not in the top 50

[phetaroi]

Bkk is a nightmare airport full of scams not in the top 50

"nightmare"

"full of scams"

hyperbole

[prism]

My only real gripe I have with Swampy is the very awkward meeting area for arriving passengers. I have to fly through LAX a couple of times a year. Whenever I have to queue up (up to 2 hours sometimes) to have my bags screened after I already checked in and then proceed to wait up to another 30 minutes to go through security, swampy starts to look pretty good by comparison.

Yes, I agree about the "meeting place". Very confusing. Last time I came in I was having so much trouble finding my party...only to discover they had forgotten which day I was coming in! But still for well over 30 minutes I wandered back and forth between two meeting places, hoping not to miss them.

I actually think it's easy to meet people in soo-wanna-poom - all the exit doors are numbered. eg I always meet at exit door 3.

I know, I use that strategy now. I had to learn the hard way the first time trying to find my elderly mother.

[think_too_mut]

#13 Centrair Nagoya should be higher up the list; a truly amazing airport.

Perhaps, the surveyers/respondents did not realzi they were inside an airport.

Centrair Nagoya:

[game4shame]

I mostly agree with that list. BKK is a very good airport that has a few flaws. When the Rail link is finished, the airport might even move up a couple of notches. BKK sure beats any U.S airport, especially LAX.

Bkk is a nightmare airport full of scams not in the top 50

nightmare airport? if not THE easiest/best airport to navigate round it's definitely up there with the best I've been to. spacious, clutter-free terminal with check-in desks and gates that are all easily located through clear signs/monitors.

and scams? the only thing I can think of that could be described as a scam in soo-wanna-poom would be the limo touts. just walk past them and go get a public taxi or bus. problem solved.

[smokie36]

My favourite aspect of Suvarnbhami is the foot massage places in International Depatures. Great to have this service before a long flight. It always leaves me feeling less cramp on the flight. Just wish other airports would do the same!

[ExpatJ]

Changi is my favourite by far...my biggest problem with swampy is during the day it gets hot- the aircon is not effective in a space that size- even to the extent that its too hot to sit comfortably in some of the food outlets.

[Ricardo]

What happen to CNX?

No beach, for sunbathing or swimming, while awaiting one's connecting-flight !

[reallyok]

KL, Beijing...Brisbane?!?. What a joke. If Beijing's on there, the price of a take away coffee obviously wasn't a consideration.

BRISBANE has two terminals ........1) Domestic

........2) International.

Which one are you whingeing about !

[reallyok]

Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi Airport Named Among Top Ten

BANGKOK: -- Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi International Airport has been ranked the 10th in the 2010 World Airport Awards. The Skytrax World Airport Awards were announced at the first live ceremony in Brussels, Belgium, as part of Passenger Terminal Expo.

The top title as World's Best Airport went to Singapore's Changi Airport, named Airport of the Year 2010, Singapore's Changi Airport also took home awards for Best Airport Leisure Amenities and Best Airport Asia. Changi Airport reclaimed first place after being beaten by South Korea's Incheon International Airport last year.

Suvarnabhumi International Airport entered the top ten for the first time ever, moving up from 16th position in 2009. Organizers of the survey say "change and improvement is clearly coming through at a faster pace in Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi Airport."

Joining the ranks of the top ten are South Korea's Incheon International Airport, which came in second this year. It is followed by the Hong Kong International Airport, Munich, Kuala Lumpur, Zurich, Amsterdam, Beijing, and Auckland. Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi International Airport comes in this year at tenth place.

-- Tan Network 2010-03-26

[newsfooter][/newsfooter]

Depends on personal opinions i suppose................I thought Auckland a dump !

[reallyok]

OK Let's consider the ten WORST airports in the World.

I nominate the self-styled World's busiest, that hel_l hole of a place called Heathrow. Dirty, ugly, busy, expensive, unfriendly. Need I add more. It is like being at a soccer game as far as crowding goes. Although, to be fair, I have not used the new terminal (5) but I have heard that it is something else. Think of it. Five terminals, all on a par size-wise, with Swampy.

I wouldn't go that far mate. LHR would be one hel_l of an airport if each of the 5 terminals were the size of soo-wanna-poom!!

Maybe yes. But none is much smaller and I know nothing about 5.

My real gripe was that the place is always so busy. Whatever terminal.

I can only imagine you haven't spent much time in the departure lounge at Terminal 3. Every time I pass through I meet the happiest group of people in the UK.

Yeh ! they are all leaving..........lolololol

[infernalman7]

LHR terminal 3 = sad face

Believe it or not, but LCCT in Kuala Lumpur is better than LHR T3.

[needforspeed]

Suvarnabhumi airport made a lot of improvements and they disserve a place in the top 10, small details free magazines to read at the gates are all Thai language, new plant/flowers decoration beautiful.

Negative point, some food outlets (oval ones) change into the selling off the usual weekend market stuff.

Love affair with Don Muang i have as well, nothing to do with the Airport, just the first time arrived in LOS, the heat, smell and thousands off people.

Never forget that

Edited April 1, 2010 by needforspeed

[smokie36]

Suvarnabhumi airport made a lot of improvements and they disserve a place in the top 10, small details free magazines to read at the gates are all Thai language, new plant/flowers decoration beautiful.

Negative point, some food outlets (oval ones) change into the selling off the usual weekend market stuff.

Love affair with Don Muang i have as well, nothing to do with the Airport, just the first time arrived in LOS, the heat, smell and thousands off people.

Never forget that

The small and charming bar outside domestic where I, with no idea of where I was going , met some people who were headed to Samui and booked a flight and tagged along....shame its gone now....my first memory of Thailand....!

[smokie36]

Suvarnabhumi airport made a lot of improvements and they disserve a place in the top 10, small details free magazines to read at the gates are all Thai language, new plant/flowers decoration beautiful.

Negative point, some food outlets (oval ones) change into the selling off the usual weekend market stuff.

Love affair with Don Muang i have as well, nothing to do with the Airport, just the first time arrived in LOS, the heat, smell and thousands off people.

Never forget that

sorry double post.

Edited April 2, 2010 by smokie36

[NamKAheng]

For the ones who ask how they come to that ranking let me say that they are doing survey in each airport I filled one of those survey in Hong Kong.

Someone talk about Suvarnabhumi airport being full of scams I must say that on my last trip (February-March 2010) I was surprise to see that the airport was free of the taxi-limousine scams that I was seeing since the opening they clearly clean their act about this problem.

I found this airport not that bad at all I only have 3 complaints:

-Air conditioning (getting very hot in the afternoon)

-Domestic flight to Phuket were you have to take a bus to the international terminal and walking up the stairs to go inside the plane, I don't have any problem with stairs but some have, has a example I had to help a old woman with her cabin luggage in the stairs on my last trip. The reason is that they did not finished the repair of the sinking airplane docking parking on the domestic side.

-On some concourse (like the E international concourse) after the security check you don't have any services like restaurant or store so you will well advise to buy your water bottle before the security check, ho! wait a minute you can't pass the security check with a water bottle! My advise for that concourse is to go to the security check at the last minutes if you don't have a access to the business class lounge.

For those reasons or until they they fix them I don't see why they should be getting a better rank.

Worst airports I visit in the last few years:

-La Gardia New York airport, dirty, small alleys long waiting at the taxi queues, confusing sign

-Heathrow terminal 3 because of the long walk (terminal 5 is very good)

-JFK and LAX for the same reason, I travelled a lot to these 2 airports so it's not a problem for me but for the newbies it can be very confusing to travel from and to other terminals

-The old Kai Tak Hong Kong airport was one of the worst, the new one is one of the best

[321niti123]

KL, Beijing...Brisbane?!?. What a joke. If Beijing's on there, the price of a take away coffee obviously wasn't a consideration.

When was the last time you've been to beijing international because i think they opened a new airport during the olympics, if i understand my chinese accent tour guide correctly the last time i've been there

[Gary A]

I hate all airports but I hate LAX more than the rest of them.

[ExpatJ]

LAX is a horrible airport, like landing in a third world country.

Changi is my favorite by far (plus alot of good memories traveling through to meet my ex singaporean gf who was a business new presenter for channel news asia- hot chinese sing and Oxford educated (was playing out of my league on that one:-)

Swampy, if it got some good air conditioning it would be ok.

Biggest surpise- Seam Reap airport cambodia has the fastest (and free) wifi i have come across in an airport.

[smokie36]

LAX is a horrible airport, like landing in a third world country.

Changi is my favorite by far (plus alot of good memories traveling through to meet my ex singaporean gf who was a business new presenter for channel news asia- hot chinese sing and Oxford educated (was playing out of my league on that one:-)

Swampy, if it got some good air conditioning it would be ok.

Biggest surpise- Seam Reap airport cambodia has the fastest (and free) wifi i have come across in an airport.

Phnom Penh also 10mins from landing to getting a tuktuk into town. Check in a breeze and free internet in the departure lounge. A pleasure to use imo.

[ExpatJ]

LAX is a horrible airport, like landing in a third world country.

Changi is my favorite by far (plus alot of good memories traveling through to meet my ex singaporean gf who was a business new presenter for channel news asia- hot chinese sing and Oxford educated (was playing out of my league on that one:-)

Swampy, if it got some good air conditioning it would be ok.

Biggest surpise- Seam Reap airport cambodia has the fastest (and free) wifi i have come across in an airport.

Phnom Penh also 10mins from landing to getting a tuktuk into town. Check in a breeze and free internet in the departure lounge. A pleasure to use imo.

Also Hanoi business airport lounge has the best food among airports in SE Asia IMHO

[khunjake]

Worst Airports...

- Manila

- Los Angeles

- London Heathrow

The Best...

- Seoul Incheon

- Singapore

- Hong Kong

- Kuala Lumpur (Not LCCT)

Surely BKK is still one of worst imo but getting better very slowly. Still can understand why they use shuttle buses to board flights even when one can see plenty of open jet-ways available.

hel_l, Phnom Penh and Delhi beat our BKK in my view!

[NamKAheng]

Surely BKK is still one of worst imo but getting better very slowly. Still can understand why they use shuttle buses to board flights even when one can see plenty of open jet-ways available.

Yes there is plenty of jet-ways unoccupied and there is a good reason, Suvarnabhumi was built on a swamp and they did not built it the right way so some jet-ways are unusable because big plane like the 747 are sinking in the tarmac because of their weight.

[prism]

Surely BKK is still one of worst imo but getting better very slowly. Still can understand why they use shuttle buses to board flights even when one can see plenty of open jet-ways available.

Yes there is plenty of jet-ways unoccupied and there is a good reason, Suvarnabhumi was built on a swamp and they did not built it the right way so some jet-ways are unusable because big plane like the 747 are sinking in the tarmac because of their weight.

I disagree. I've been on a number of arrivals to swampy where they parked at the jet-way, we then disembark the aircraft only to be diverted down a stairway right before the entrance door to the terminal and then boarded on buses to be taken to another entrance. Of coarse I've been bused to the terminal from the aircraft that parked on the tarmac on numerous arrivals. My conclusion; the airlines have to pay extra to use the jet-way so they don't to save them money.

[infernalman7]

Surely BKK is still one of worst imo but getting better very slowly. Still can understand why they use shuttle buses to board flights even when one can see plenty of open jet-ways available.

Yes there is plenty of jet-ways unoccupied and there is a good reason, Suvarnabhumi was built on a swamp and they did not built it the right way so some jet-ways are unusable because big plane like the 747 are sinking in the tarmac because of their weight.

I disagree. I've been on a number of arrivals to swampy where they parked at the jet-way, we then disembark the aircraft only to be diverted down a stairway right before the entrance door to the terminal and then boarded on buses to be taken to another entrance. Of coarse I've been bused to the terminal from the aircraft that parked on the tarmac on numerous arrivals. My conclusion; the airlines have to pay extra to use the jet-way so they don't to save them money.

This is not due to the airport at all. It's the Airlines decision to do this as they park at the wrong part of the airport. i.e. sometimes they part at the domestic section therefore they have to use the bus to get you to the right part of the airport.

Airlines that operate both domestic/international flights with code-share usually do this at Swampy. They don't want to "push back" a completely empty plane. It's just too costly. Busing people = cheaper.

[Xangsamhua]

This is a good list:

http://www.sleepinginairports.net/worst-airports.htm

Suvarnabhumi is so refreshing after Delhi.

Ninoy Aquino airport is pretty ghastly, but the staff are nice.