Terminal 3 Soekarno Hatta Airport

Photography: Charlie Hartono Lie

Narrative: JC

Catatan Walentina Waluyanti: Terima kasih buat temanku Josh Chen untuk artikelnya yang informatif di bawah ini. (Josh Chen, banyak menulis artikel informatif, adalah perintis Citizen Journalism Baltyra bersama rekan lainnya). Artikel yang telah dimuat dimuat di Baltyra.com ini bisa menjadi panduan praktis, termasuk bagi pembaca yang tidak berbahasa Indonesia.

To my knowledge, Terminal 3 was a terminal for TKI (Tenaga Kerja Indonesia, literally "Indonesian Workers"). When anyone in Indonesia heard about "terminal for TKI" in our mind will be: lousy, dirty, messy, a lot of crooks asking money from the naïve TKI coming home.

But all those stigma were totally changed when some times in the mid of 2009, I went there to pick up a friend from Medan. He flew Low Cost Carrier (Air Asia) for some business purposes in Jakarta. I was surprised and astonished to find how clean, international-look, modern looking and feeling in this new terminal.

Though at that moment the finishing has not been finalized, but I could fee new energy there. Terminal 3 was built to accommodate more passengers in the existing Terminal 1 and 2. These 2 earlier terminals were designed to accommodate about 9 million passengers a year, but now, the average passengers in Soekarno Hatta Airport are about 30 million a year.

Post financial crisis in 2001, the flow of passengers in Soekarno Hatta Airport has shown a significant increase, reaching 11 million, and growing almost-exponentially every year. The big jump was from 2003 to 2004, 18 million to 26 million passengers, and never been declined until today.

Unlike the old ones, Terminal 3 was designed with simplicity, modern, environment-friendly and energy-saving building. Steel frames and large glasses are dominating the building to save the needs of good lighting. It’s so modern, even you will hardly find any trace of Indonesian touch and detail there, the other way around with the two old ones. The total of US$28million is really worth!

Work will begin this year on a connecting building between Terminal 2 and Terminal 3. The following plans will be executed this year:

Furthermore, in the efforts of improving the services for the airport users and avoiding traffic jam, a mode of mass transportation is being developed. The plan of building the airport railway will be in cooperated with PT Kereta Api (PT INKA). The Airport Railway is planned to operate in 2010.

Hungry? No worries! There are several good stalls to indulge you. Bakmi GM, JCo, CFC, Starbucks, Hikaru Café are ready to serve. Based my own experience, Bakmi GM, JCo and Starbucks are the most crowded ones. Do not feel want to spend a few thousands Rupiah for your thirst? Free ready-to-drink tap water is ready to serve you! I was quite surprise to see several points of ready-to-drink tap water directly from the tap. Even Nursery Rooms are available there! I did not feel like in Indonesia…it’s déjà vu like in Changi Airport…

Will this Terminal 3 remain like this or following its big brothers Terminal 1 and 2 becoming dingier and dingier from time to time…only time will tell…

References:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soekarno%E2%80%93Hatta_International_Airport

http://www.jakartasoekarnohattaairport.com/terminal3/

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