It's clear why Changi took off

It’s thirty years since a former air force base on the eastern tip of Singapore was transformed into an airport that is one of the world’s favourites. Surveys of passengers and air travel professionals tell a story that Singaporeans can be proud of: Changi consistently comes top, or near the top, of the league tables.

That is despite some tough competition emerging in the region: Thailand, South Korea and Hong Kong have all spent billions of dollars on building rival hub airports. China plans to build an astonishing 45 new airports in the next five years.

Changi could not have been successful without being in Singapore. By the time it opened in the early 1980s, the city-state’s reputation was well established—and well deserved—as an efficient, clean and hard-working place to do business. That was a big competitive advantage in a region that outsiders often thought was inefficient, dirty and corrupt.

Outside of the military and space exploration, aviation is the most complicated human activity.

Safety is paramount. But so is good customer service. Hundreds of commercial service providers and government organizations need to work together smoothly. Something as simple as ill-planned road works on a main road leading to the airport can upset schedules for deliveries of food and cargo, and therefore delay flights and push up costs.

Singapore is good at thinking ahead and planning. It just works. That’s vital when running an airport.

And that raises an interesting question: is Singapore a nice city which has a great airport, or a great airport which has a nice city? And what lessons can other Asian airports learn from our experience here in Singapore?

Since ancient times, towns have sprung up when trade routes crossed: where rivers met, crude early roads converged, or around natural harbours. In the industrial revolution, towns mushroomed at railway junctions.

In the aviation age, airports have usually been built near cities they’re supposed to serve. But modern airports are beginning to look a lot like towns themselves. Obviously, there is lots of economic activity directly related to aviation, such as catering, and repair and maintenance. Now airports increasingly are destinations in their own right. Tails are starting to wag dogs.

People go there to shop or be entertained, or work in business parks for companies with no connection to aviation. Airports even have places of worship—a sure sign of community.

So it’s not that fanciful to consider the whole of Singapore as an extension of Changi. The airport sets high standards that visitors and investors expect across the whole of the island. When you exit departures and head for the taxis, there are no touts to annoy you. There’s an orderly queue of passengers, and staff to make sure the taxis are allocated fairly and leave swiftly. You can be in the centre of Singapore well under an hour after landing. It’s a pretty good introduction to Singapore (although to be fair, trying to get a taxi elsewhere in Singapore on a rainy evening still is too difficult).

No matter how good some other rival airports are in the region, the experience rapidly worsens once you leave the terminal. Shanghai airport may have a record-breakingly fast levitating train connecting it to the city. Or rather, connecting it to a part of the city that’s a long way from where visitors want to go. In many ways Incheon airport in South Korea rivals Changi, but somehow they forgot to build a high-speed rail link to Seoul.

Asian airports can learn a lot from Singapore and each other about how to be successful. There is also lot to learn from North America and Europe, where governments have retreated from the sector. Western airports can be much more aggressive commercially. They need to be, as public finances are strained. Taxpayers fund airport expansion less and less.

Today some of the more modern airports outside of Asia can make up to 40% of their profits from non-aeronautical business. They extensively provide retail space within the airport facilities. This generates capital to maintain and update the infrastructure. It helps to the airport to create jobs and deliver wider benefits to the community.

Western airport operators and airlines also face strong environmental opposition. Radical green organizations and conservative middle-class movements alike question the effects of building new airports or expanding existing facilities.

In some cases, expanding an airport can actually help to reduce the social and environmental impact yet how many people know this?

Consider Hong Kong airport. A third runway would provide additional capacity. Aircraft would spent less time idly waiting on the ground until a taxi slot became available, helping to reduce carbon emissions significantly.

Furthermore, the extra capacity would also enable the airport to vary the location of the take-off and approach corridor depending on the time of day. That could cut the noise pollution in residential areas.

Asian airport operators need to learn from that experience as the region’s green movements gain strength. More and more politicians want to demonstrate their ‘green’ credentials. The aviation industry is big and easy target. The industry needs to be more active in articulating to the world how it is mitigating the environmental impact of plans to expand.

Caspar Baum, Head of Aviation Asia, EC Harris