From: ssh@allegra.att.com (syed s haider)
Subject: Re: Karachi Airport
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill, NJ
Date: Thu, 5 Nov 1992 18:18:13 GMT

In article <1d1f16INN629@usenet.INS.CWRU.Edu> khan@ces.cwru.edu (Mansoor Khan) writes:
>
>		Karachi's New Airport Building
>		==============================
>
>	Karachi's new airport building was opened recently. 
>	If anyone has used the new building, would (s)he mind
>	sharing their opinion of the architecture, facilities,
>	service, and whatever of the Airport.
>	Now  Karachi atleast has a new and modern( may be small)
>	airport. And, hopefully this will promote tourism, business,
>	and commercial activity in Karachi and in the rest of Pakistan. 
>	Let's talk airport.

I was on the 3rd or 4th PIA flight that landed at the Jinnah Terminal
on Aug 27.  It's a very well-designed vesterrrn-style terminal complete
with two satellites of 6-8 gates each.  It was also sparklingly clean
after 4 hours of use :-)  Can it be maintained as well as it was built
is the real question.  The internal design is conventional, with
a corridor leading into the satellite and 6-8 gates arranged in
a circle.  One wing is used exclusively for international flights,
the other for domestic.  I hear the design is by some French firm
and the maintenance contract has been given to another foreign
company.

The original plan was to build 6-8 satellites for a total craft
capacity of around 50 planes but apparently they ran out of money
by the time the first two were built.  But what is there is so
far indistinguishable from any other modern airport.  There are
two levels, the upper one for departures, the lower one for arrivals.
Pan-chewing is prohibited according to the signs.  That alone should
double the life of the building!  The floor and walls are marble-like
possibly for violators of the above law.  I think I recall seeing
an escalator, though it wasn't functioning then.  One problem with
the "gates" is that there is only one per plane, so all you first-class
passengers will have to share the entrance/exit with the rest of
us peons.  There is no "branch" to go to both front doors of the
aircraft.  There are lots of signs for baggage claim, gates, wash
rooms, etc.

The terminal is about 2 km from the now old Karachi airport.  You
just keep going on Drigh Road past Stargate and turn left a little
later.  There appears to be plenty of parking, with some exit signs
dotting the lot.

Of course we experienced a couple of glitches which were mainly
operational in nature.  When we landed there was a 15 minute
delay because the operator was having trouble moving the arm
to line up with the plane's door.  The pilot duly apologized for
the delay.  Then upon our departure 5 days later we were waiting
by our departure gate.  The departure time came and went but still
there was no plane to be seen.  Finally a door in the center of the
room was opened and we discovered a flight of stairs leading to
the ground level.  From there we boarded the familiar green bus
and were ferried to ... the old terminal where our plane was waiting!

All in all, a very impressive structure.  Let's hope they maintain
it and sort out the procedural snags quickly.

Shehryar
ssh@allegra.att.com