Kuala Lumpur International Airport Totally Explained

Everything about Kuala Lumpur International Airport totally explained

Kuala Lumpur International Airport commonly known as KLIA is one of Asia's major aviation hubs, along with Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi Airport, Hong Kong International Airport and Singapore Changi Airport. It is also Malaysia's main international airport. It is situated in Sepang district, in the south of the state of Selangor, about from the capital city, Kuala Lumpur. Built at a cost of some US$3.5 billion, KLIA was opened on 27 June 1998 in time for the 1998 Commonwealth Games.
   Kuala Lumpur International Airport is capable of handling 35 million passengers and 1.2 million tonnes of cargo a year in its current phase. It is currently ranked as the 13th busiest airport in the world by international passenger traffic in 2007, behind Madrid Barajas International Airport and one of Asia's busiest airport where it has handled 26,938,970 passengers in the year of 2007, a 13.0% increase over 2005 fiscal year. In the same year, Kuala Lumpur International Airport has handled 677 446 metric tonnes of cargo or 3.6% increase in volume over year 2005. The increase in cargo volume made Kuala Lumpur International Airport entry to being one of the busiest airport by cargo traffic, ranked 30th among all other airports.
   The airport is operated by Malaysia Airports (MAHB) Sepang Sdn Bhd and is the airline hub or home base for Malaysia Airlines, MASkargo, AirAsia and AirAsia X. KLIA is also the stopover point for the kangaroo route for Malaysia Airlines, as well as KLM. KLM operates the kangaroo route by feeding European passengers in Kuala Lumpur International Airport to Australia and New Zealand on Malaysia Airlines operated flights. Jetstar, the low cost offshoot of Australia's Qantas is also considering making Kuala Lumpur International Airport as their hub for long haul flights.
   Kuala Lumpur International Airport is serving Klang Valley Metropolitan Region, Greater Klang Valley, Shah Alam, Malacca, Selangor and South Perak. With the large catchment area, the airport became one of the key economic strength for the nation, where it's well connected expressways to all parts of Malaysia, some of the highly industralized areas like Shah Alam and the information and communications technology hub, Multimedia Super Corridor. It is one of the important component in the economy of Malaysia as the airport is the main import-export center for the country.
   The IATA airport code, KUL was inherited from the previous international gateway for Malaysia, Subang International Airport, which currently handles only turboprop aircraft.

History

The planning of KLIA began in 1990 when the government decided that the existing Subang International Airport (now Sultan Abdul Aziz Shah Airport) couldn't handle future demand. Malaysia's Prime Minister Mahathir bin Mohamad was a prime driver behind the project, which was seen as an important component of the Multimedia Super Corridor.
   The decision was controversial. The location, over 51 km from Kuala Lumpur, was viewed as inconvenient; the cost ballooned from original estimates; critics alleged that, contrary to the government's assertions, Subang could still be expanded. Indeed, work on Subang continued simultaneously with KLIA's construction. Subang's new Terminal 3 was opened in December 1993 and Terminal 2 was refurbished in 1995, only three years before KLIA's opening.
   With the airport site spanning 100 km², it's one of the largest airport sites in the world. It is built on a piece of agricultural land and required no demolition of private property. The master plan of Kuala Lumpur International Airport involves constructing five runways, and two terminals accompanied by two satellite terminals for each terminal over three phases. Phase One development includes constructing one main terminal accompanied by one satellite terminal that's enough to accommodate 25 million passengers and dual full service runways. Under the implementation of Phase One, sixty contact piers, twenty remote parking bays with eighty aircraft parking positions, four maintenance hangars and fire stations will be built. Implementation of phase two and three will be expansions of the airport to include increasing number of passengers. Ultimately, the airport will be able to handle 100 million passengers per annum once all three phases are implemented..
   With the workforce of 25,000 workers working 24 hours a day, the airport was built within four and half years. The airport was officially inaugurated on June 27, 1998, a week ahead of Hong Kong International Airport, but flights were shifted from Subang only three days later on June 30. The first domestic arrival was Malaysia Airlines's MH1263 from Kuantan (Kuantan Airport) at 7.10am and first international passenger jet arrival was Malaysia Airlines's MH188 from the Maldives at 7.30am. The inauguration of the airport was marked with problems. Aerobridge and bay allocation systems broke down, queues formed throughout the airport, and baggage handling broke down, with lost bags and waits of over five hours. Most of these issues were sorted out eventually, but the baggage handling system continued to be plagued with problems, and it was finally put up for a new complete replacement tender in 2007.
   The airport also had to contend with the East Asian financial crisis, SARS and Bird Flu Epidemic (Avian Flu) which decimated passenger traffic in Malaysia and the region. Passenger growth was negative during the financial crisis and airlines that had started flights to KLIA including All Nippon Airways, British Airways, Lufthansa and Northwest Airlines, terminated their services due to unprofitability. The first phase of the airport was designed with a capacity of 25 million passengers per year but on the first full year of operations in 1999, it saw only 13.2 million. However, traffic did eventually increase with 21.1 million passengers recorded in 2004 and 23.2 million in 2005 — although this, too, fell short of the original estimate of 25 million by the year 2003.
   The name Kuala Lumpur International Airport was previously used as an alternative name for the Sultan Abdul Aziz Shah Airport (SZB) in Subang.

Expansion and Developments

Plans

Under the new Kuala Lumpur International Airport Masterplan, a new runway and a new satellite building will be constructed to accommodate the increasing number of passengers. The airport Phase 2 development plan is to handle 40 million (5 Million) passengers per year by 2008 with the expansion of low cost carrier terminal. For phase 3, the airport will expand to handle 75 million (35 million) passengers per annum with the construction of a new satellite terminal and replacement of current low cost carrier terminal with a new low cost carrier terminal that capable of handling 30 million passengers alone. Phase 4, the airport will be capable to 130 million passengers per annum by 2020.
With the slight modification of the masterplan, the future Terminal 2's satellite terminal will be combined into one satellite terminal. The expansion of Terminal 2's satellite terminal will be exactly the same as Terminal 1's satellite terminal, where initially the satellite terminal will have four arms, and another four arms when the terminal reached its capacity. There is sufficient land and capacity to develop facilities to handle up to 130 million passengers a year, five runways by the year 2020 and two mega-terminals, each linked with satellite terminals. The airport's vicinity will include hiking trails for jet-lagged travelers, golf courses, convention center, a theme park, a shopping center, hotels, and a wetlands nature preserve. Sepang International Circuit, which hosts Formula 1 and MotoGP races, is also nearby. There has also been a proposal for a monorail link to the F1 circuit. The development plan is due to be ready by April 2008.
In November 2006, the Malaysian government announced that it had approved in principal the construction of a rail link between the main terminal building and the low cost carrier terminal. Construction is scheduled to begin in 2007. There were however no details of which company would carry out the project, nor was there an indication that it would be directly connected to the existing airport high-speed train Express Rail Link

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