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How Berlin’s Futuristic Airport Became a $6B Embarrassment

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Re: How Berlin’s Futuristic Airport Became a $6B Embarrassment

#101

Post by MrBuddyCasino »

Kenji wrote: post #99

I don't understand why the state funds airports. If people want airports, there is a demand, and that demand is either big enough to fund an airport and is satisfied, or it isn't because people don't want to spend that kind of money. Seems to me like something the state shouldn't be involved in.

The theory that is taken out of the drawer in such occasions is that the airport will have "a positive economical impact on the whole region, so the calculation isn't that simple". Sometimes it works, but in most cases it doesn't.

Re: How Berlin’s Futuristic Airport Became a $6B Embarrassment

#102

Post by Kenji »

MrBuddyCasino wrote: post #101
Kenji wrote: post #99

I don't understand why the state funds airports. If people want airports, there is a demand, and that demand is either big enough to fund an airport and is satisfied, or it isn't because people don't want to spend that kind of money. Seems to me like something the state shouldn't be involved in.

The theory that is taken out of the drawer in such occasions is that the airport will have "a positive economical impact on the whole region, so the calculation isn't that simple". Sometimes it works, but in most cases it doesn't.

If "the calculation isn't that simple" how come the politicians think they can figure out the solution, but the collective hivemind of demand and offer by literally all participants of the economy cannot?

Re: How Berlin’s Futuristic Airport Became a $6B Embarrassment

#103

Post by CrLf »

stffndtz wrote: post #95
germanier wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I was surprised to see that we were using the actual airstrip of BER. The flight was supposed to go to SXF (Berlin Schönefeld), but instead we landed on the new airstrip, driving by the not-yet-finished new airport. Can anyone tell me why? They repurposed the south airstrip of SXF as the north airstrip of BER. As the north airstrip of SXF was dismantled for a highway this is the only remaining airstrip at SXF. For…

I wasn't aware of that - but did they increase the number of planes starting and landing on SXF? It wasn't until a couple of months ago since they started taxi'ing around the building, or am I wrong?

I visited Berlin in 2012, and I remember taxiing near the BER terminal.

Re: How Berlin’s Futuristic Airport Became a $6B Embarrassment

#104

Post by omnibrain »

Kliment wrote: post #72
netcan wrote: post #68

Why do airports always need to be so ambitious? Usually the simple airports are best anyway.

The worst thing about BER is that it's designed to replace Tegel, which is easily the most sensibly built major airport in Germany. Space-efficient, cheap to operate, high-throughput, built very quickly with limited resources to solve a specific problem.

The problem with Tegel is, that they neither built the second terminal ring nor the subway station. And there is no room for another runway.

Re: How Berlin’s Futuristic Airport Became a $6B Embarrassment

#105

Post by bluecalm »

raverbashing wrote: post #33
bluecalm wrote: post #15

There is a joke in my country (Poland) about every little town needing: -an airport -an aquapark -a huge sport stadion All of them as a way to transfer some state/town money to political cronies. The sad part is that some of those make sense as an infrastructure improvement (most doesn't though, at least here) so it's easier to sell the idea to people. The way the business is done is to just pay 30%-50% more than it…

That's for the Amateurs, Professionals do a whole World Cup

We went for smaller stakes by doing Euro 2012. I live in one of the hosting cities and it's easy to tell a lot of construction work was half-arsed and never finished (mainly roads). There is also not enough traffic to make the big stadium close to profitable but hey, that's another opportunity for the town to transfer some money to local football club (a lot of our politicians are connected to football structures).

It would be funny if it wasn't sad. No wonder people avoid paying taxes when they see the money being wasted all around and citizens not ever asked about new crazy idea to build with it. We already have an expensive aquapark, huge stadium and two airports though. I wonder what's next for a town with a population of 600k in one of the poorest EU countries.

Re: How Berlin’s Futuristic Airport Became a $6B Embarrassment

#106

Post by germanier »

mturmon wrote: post #97
strictnein wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not a fan of DFW's terminal setup and roads. All that space and that tangle of off-ramps and on-ramps and bridges is the best they could do? Satellite shot: https://goo.gl/peXr25

Hmm, this multi-terminal, spread-out, "park right by the gate" design reminded me of Kansas City International airport. Turns out this was a trend in airport design in the early 1970s - KCI opened in 1972 and DFW in 1973. TWA, among others, pushed this design.

Interestingly they used a similar approach at Berlin Tegel airport, with the current terminal building opened in 1975 (which is supposed to be closed down after the airport featured here is ready).

Re: How Berlin’s Futuristic Airport Became a $6B Embarrassment

#107

Post by blakeyrat »

CurtHagenlocher wrote: post #35
nsns wrote: post #8

But is it only BER? As mentioned int the article - what about Stuttgart 21 ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stuttgart_21 ) etc.? It is possible that these sites exist as new financial "loopholes", transferring tax-money from the government to private contractors without much oversight.

The complexity of that project is extremely high. My cousin is a civil engineer in Stuttgart, and he showed me a cross-sectional diagram of the affected area and the number of considerations seemed intractably high to me. But more generally, these kinds of megaprojects go over budget in nearly every part of the world -- especially when tunneling is involved. Here in the United States, two examples are Boston's "Big D…

In the interests of being pedantic, and local pride: Seattle's viaduct replacement isn't over budget-- yet.

It's extremely likely to go over budget, but don't count the chickens before they've hatched. The last budget review came to the conclusion that it's still possible to finish the project as budgeted and scheduled.

http://www.king5.com/story/news/local/seattle/2015/04/23/ber...

Re: How Berlin’s Futuristic Airport Became a $6B Embarrassment

#108

Post by venomsnake »

Xylakant wrote: post #43
venomsnake wrote: post #32

I wonder what kind of austerity will be imposed on the poor Berliners for wasting so much money /s

It's a bit more complicated since the airport is a joint venture between Berlin, Brandenburg and the Federal Government which all hold roughly a third of the shares. And while it's an embarrassing waste of money the german constitution stipulates in Art. 109 Abs. 3 Satz 1 GG that starting 2016 the federal government cannot exceed 0.35% of the GDP in new debts and and starting 2020 the state governments are not allowe…

Well ... enjoy the show :( Too bad that this stupidity persists so much.

Re: How Berlin’s Futuristic Airport Became a $6B Embarrassment

#109

Post by eric_the_read »

strictnein wrote: post #14
hvs wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Denver still has the issue that it's a 20 mile drive from downtown out of some misguided belief that the city was just going to instantly grow out to it.

And all the crazy artwork. The conspiracy theorists go nuts over it. http://mysteryoftheiniquity.com/2011/03/20/denver-internatio...

I had no idea there were so many conspiracies about the airport, despite the fact that I fly out of it all the time. http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Denver_Airport_conspiracy_theor... debunks several, though all it can really say about the art is, "Huh, yeah, that's weird. So what?" which isn't particularly dispositive.

That demon horse scares the crap out of me, though.

Re: How Berlin’s Futuristic Airport Became a $6B Embarrassment

#110

Post by phkahler »

therobot24 wrote: post #6

> "Professor, let me understand this," Loge said. "You are talking about having 800 people wearing orange vests, sitting on camping stools, holding thermoses filled with coffee, and shouting into their cell phones, 'Open the fire door'?" Loge refused the airport an operating license. Schwarz stood up and walked out without another word. Easily the best part of the article.

>> "You are talking about having 800 people wearing orange vests, sitting on camping stools, holding thermoses filled with coffee, and shouting into their cell phones, 'Open the fire door'?"

Funny thing is, if they had allowed that there would never be an opportunity to fix it correctly. It would require shutting down the airport for quite some time.

The parallels with software and other areas of engineering are a bit disturbing.

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