Beijing’s newest dragon takes flight

Once you’ve lived in China for a while, it’s easy to get jaded about superlatives. World’s biggest this, world’s tallest that, world’s fastest the other. Whatever.

But even the Dragon Chaser’s cynical jaw dropped a bit the other day as he disembarked from his favorite Chinese carrier (DragonAir, natch!) into the enormity of Beijing Capital Airport’s new Terminal Three.

Designed by British architect Norman Foster in the shape of (what else?) a giant dragon, T-3 seems meant to inspire in foreign visitors to the Beijing Olympics the sense of awe once felt by emissaries to the Forbidden City. Pillars of imperial red supporting a soaring gold roof canopy drive home the message. Lest anyone still miss the point, the structure is adorned with replicas of some of China’s best known art treasures, including China’s most famous scroll painting and carvings imitating the famed (surprise!) Nine-Dragon Screen.

This photo, snapped hastily along my Long March from the gate to Immigration, doesn’t begin to convey the scale. (For a better idea, check out this report on CNN by ITN correspondent John Ray.)

With 14 million square feet of floor space, T-3 is not only the world’s largest air terminal (big enough, according to Sir Norman, to house all five terminals at Heathrow combined) but the world’s largest building period.

Built for $3.6 billion in just four years, Foster’s glass and steel dragon stretches nearly two miles in length. Triangular skylights in the rooftop evoke dragon scales. The structure boasts a capacity of 76 million passengers, who will be whisked to their gates by a high-speed commuter train. Their bags will travel along 40 miles of conveyor belts capable of handling 20,000 pieces of luggage an hours.

In stark contrast to Beijing’s dowdy two original terminals, which seemed designed to encourage you to rush to your boarding gate as quickly as possible, T-3 tempts passengers to tarry with 64 restaurants and 84 shops. And of course the facility has been built to accommodate the new Airbus A380 superjumbo.

Dragon chasing gets a little more civilized every day.