Don Mueang Airport To Operate At Full Capacity Again To Ease Crowding At Suvarnabhumi

[josephbloggs]

www.irrawaddy.org/archives/9460

best article I have read on swampy, runway closures are major problem.

I have to disagree - I think it's a terrible article as it contains little of any substance. I'm no great lover of SVB but I use it often and I think it is "ok". I've been to many better airports and I've been to many more worse ones. But apart from the issue of cracks what does the article tell us?

"Some passengers were forced to wait up to four hours for their baggage to appear on the day it was inaugurated." Wow, some passengers waited four hours for their bags on a single day SIX years ago!! Check out what happened to Hong Kong airport on its opening day, likewise Heathrow Terminal 5. Seriously, putting something like that in an article shows extreme bias in my opinion.

Then they go on to quote some conjecture by an anonymous man on an internet forum - or "an engineer on the Thai Visa Forum website" as they put it. Again, irrelevant and exceedingly sloppy journalism. Whatever happened to checking your sources?

They then described an incident that caused four flights to be delayed.

The rest of the article is then devoted to passenger comments and some untrue statements. A passenger doesn't like it because there are long walks. Yes, it is a big airport. Believe it or not you also have to walk long distances at other large airports. Another passenger says the restaurants are not diverse enough and are "tucked away". Oh, poor him.

It then goes on to describe how a plane had to circle for an hour! The horror! SVB has two runways and does get very busy. On my last trip back to the UK I had to circle for close to 90 minutes but, guess what, nobody interviewed me about it. It happens.

Sorry, that was one of the worst articles I have read. Devoting so much space to conjecture, opinion and quotes from internet forums - especially this one! - is not a good example of journalism at all; far from it.

SVB does have it's problems and I do believe (not that I know) that the runways and taxiways were badly constructed. But this article is so slanted it should have been written in italics.

[Mosha]

Seems OneWorld denies any intention to shift their member airline operations over to DMK...

Could be some farce saving exercises due shortly...

What does this post mean? It's written like some kind of conspiracy theory, "OneWorld denies any intention".

From ch-aviation

British Airways and other fellow Oneworld alliance members who operate into Bangkok Suvarnabhumi International have all denied claims by Airports of Thailand that the group was keen to relocate their operations to Bangkok's old airport, Bangkok Don Mueang International , citing "flight connectivity constraints and service quality for premium passengers as key impediments." The other reports that newly appointed AoT chairman, Sqn Ldr Sita Divari, had on March 27 said that "Oneworld was interested in shifting to Don Mueang, even suggesting that the alliance had proposed the airport be upgraded to handle A380-800s." Despite opening as recently as 2006, Suvarnabhumi International has already exceeded its planned operating capacity of 50 million passengers per year by 5 million, forcing Thai authorities to push Don Mueang as an alternative in order to alleviate congestion.

Edited April 8, 2013 by Mosha

[rubl]

"has already exceeded its planned operating capacity of 50 million passengers per year by 5 million"?

We have had 55 million passengers arriving/leaving from Swampy?

[IsaanUSA]

"has already exceeded its planned operating capacity of 50 million passengers per year by 5 million"?

We have had 55 million passengers arriving/leaving from Swampy?

Suvarnabhumi had 52,368,712 passengers for the 2012 fiscal year according to AOT.

For the year of 2011, the airport had 47,910,904 passengers according to the AOT.

I think 55 million is a safe assumption.

http://www.airportthai.co.th/th/irweb/thai/investor_th.html Click the English link in the upper right hand corner

Edited April 8, 2013 by IsaanUSA

[samran]

www.irrawaddy.org/archives/9460

best article I have read on swampy, runway closures are major problem.

I have to disagree - I think it's a terrible article as it contains little of any substance. I'm no great lover of SVB but I use it often and I think it is "ok". I've been to many better airports and I've been to many more worse ones. But apart from the issue of cracks what does the article tell us?

"Some passengers were forced to wait up to four hours for their baggage to appear on the day it was inaugurated." Wow, some passengers waited four hours for their bags on a single day SIX years ago!! Check out what happened to Hong Kong airport on its opening day, likewise Heathrow Terminal 5. Seriously, putting something like that in an article shows extreme bias in my opinion.

Then they go on to quote some conjecture by an anonymous man on an internet forum - or "an engineer on the Thai Visa Forum website" as they put it. Again, irrelevant and exceedingly sloppy journalism. Whatever happened to checking your sources?

They then described an incident that caused four flights to be delayed.

The rest of the article is then devoted to passenger comments and some untrue statements. A passenger doesn't like it because there are long walks. Yes, it is a big airport. Believe it or not you also have to walk long distances at other large airports. Another passenger says the restaurants are not diverse enough and are "tucked away". Oh, poor him.

It then goes on to describe how a plane had to circle for an hour! The horror! SVB has two runways and does get very busy. On my last trip back to the UK I had to circle for close to 90 minutes but, guess what, nobody interviewed me about it. It happens.

Sorry, that was one of the worst articles I have read. Devoting so much space to conjecture, opinion and quotes from internet forums - especially this one! - is not a good example of journalism at all; far from it.

SVB does have it's problems and I do believe (not that I know) that the runways and taxiways were badly constructed. But this article is so slanted it should have been written in italics.

Good analysis - I'm through swampy pretty often, a couple of times per month at the moment and what you are saying is spot on.

The one thing that is striking for me though, the place seems to be strugging under the weight of its own 'success'. Floors are dirty, seats are broken and there just seems to be a sense of too much adhockery for my liking (eg temp looking bathrooms, signs written on A4 sheets of paper, closed shops with no new tenants).

Fortunately, immigration seems to be much faster these days so I'm not there long enough to really let it annoy me.

[ubonrthai]

Yesterday.