Revamped Changi Airport Terminal 2 fully operational now
Dhaka: The revamped Terminal 2 of Singapore’s Changi Airport is fully operational again, following three and a half years of engineering work. With the terminal’s reopening, Changi Airport has restored its four terminal operations ahead of schedule.
T2’s completion has added five million passengers a year to the airport’s capacity and brought Changi’s total handling capacity to 90 million passengers a year.
Speaking at the T2 expansion opening ceremony, Teo Chee Hean, Senior Minister and Coordinating Minister for National Security of Singapore said, “The T2 expansion project started in January 2020, two months before Singapore closed its borders because of the Covid-19 pandemic. At the time, no one knew how severe the pandemic would be, or how long it would last. However, Changi Airport Group pushed ahead with the T2 expansion, driven by the conviction that our Changi air hub would not only recover from the pandemic, but emerge stronger.”
A nature-inspired theme to create tranquillity and relaxation is what guides the T2’s design philosophy. At the heart of T2’s departure hall stands a 14-metre-tall digital display, dubbed The Wonderfall, set amid a vertical garden.
Inside the departure transit area, a brand-new landscaped garden dubbed Dreamscape emerges by a ‘digital sky’ which changes its hues depending on the time of day.
Additional infrastructure at T2 includes new systems and more retail offerings. With a central common-use Fast and Seamless Travel (FAST) zone, the number of automated check-in kiosks and bag drop machines has almost doubled. The immigration halls have been expanded to support additional automated immigration lanes allowing more passengers to be served at any time.
T2 is also the first terminal in Changi to have automated Special Assistance Lanes for persons with disabilities and young children at both arrival and departure immigration. A new early baggage storage system has also been installed that is fully automated with the capacity to handle up to 2,400 bags.
More retail and food and beverage outlets have opened in both T2’s public and transit areas. Visitors to the public areas of T2 will be treated to a range of novel concepts, including South-east Asia’s first Funko pop-up. Visitors will be able to pose with larger-than-life Funko statues of their favourite fictional characters.
Changi Airport’s first landside duplex cafe, Jones the Grocer, is another addition to the departure hall. This well-known artisanal café features a grab-and-go deli-style food counter at the ground level, which is now open, as well as an upper-level bar and restaurant complete with a show kitchen, set to open later in 2023.
In transit, travellers will be greeted by the newly opened Lotte Duty Free Wines and Spirits, which showcases a first-in-airport robot bartender Toni.
Above the bar, a 30-metre circumference LED ring plays scenes of the moon reflected in a lake, a homage to Tang dynasty poet Li Bai’s famous work, Drinking Alone Under the Moon.
- T
