AlwaysAisle

HND (Haneda airport) ranked as 4th busiest airport in the world in 2017 in terms of number of passengers handled with 85 million passengers. HND handled more passengers than LAX (Los Angeles), ORD (Chicago), or LHR (London Heathrow) in 2017. However, being at all those airports in 2017, personally I felt as terminals were busier at LAX, ORD, and LHR compare with HND. Is it the way terminal buildings were designed? Yes, HND gutted old terminal buildings once stood at current International terminal location. Current Terminal 1, Terminal 2, and International Terminal at HND are far newer than terminal buildings at LAX, ORD, and LHR. Does that make difference in terms of passenger experience?

For reference, busiest airport in 2017 was ATL. 2nd was PEK, and 3rd was DXB.

basscadet75

A lot probably depends on the time of year or even time of day that you go. Go around New Year's, Golden Week or during spring break (which was a couple of weeks ago), which often coincides with the cherry blossoms blooming, and HND's domestic terminals are a madhouse. The international terminal has never felt that crowded when I've been there but it's a lot smaller than the domestic terminals, so probably doesn't contribute nearly as much to the passenger numbers anyway.

kaka

well its a mainly domestic airport with a 20 minutes checkin cut off. and they seperate the northern routes and southern routes so you only see 1/4 of the domestic pax at one time. not the whole story, but it helps.

jib71

LHR T2 and T5 are new but feel more crowded / busy / stressful than HND to me.

runningonfumes

huge domestic traffic through t1 and t2 with organized staff and respectful pax will make any other airport look like sheeit and disorganized.

The international terminal at hnd post security and in fact before is garbage unless you are wanting to buy LV and other garbage lux goods.

I wish the international side had the domestic stores pre and post security.

international side of HND is garbage.

jib71

The range of in-terminal shopping is low on my list of concerns if the terminal is easy to use and I have access to a decent lounge. YMMV.

runningonfumes

Yes. Some might have a little higher expectations. It's sad. I forgot how sad even compared to NRT internationally and it's not that great. But one needs to set their expectations very low for HND international. Unless you eat at the place that will make you smell like fried noodles for your flight.

jib71

Seems like we're getting off topic here - The observation that the airport doesn't feel as crowded as other airports that handle a similar number of passengers is an interesting one IMHO.

evergrn

For me, as well, these stats don't necessarily correlate with eye test.
It's hard to believe HND being #4 in the world, unless T1 (the one terminal there I'm not that familiar with) is crazy busy.
Hard to believe NRT having less pax volume than SEA or TPE.
In fact, I can't believe SEA is busier than PHX. But I don't want to steer discussion away from Jpn.

mjm

I hear busy or crowded and dread the commute (with trains), but with HND I love the mere 20 mins to/from town and a taxi being a real and affordable possibility for late arrivals with a box of wine as checked luggage.

kaka

i think t1/2 are equally busy, just that everything is more orderly in hnd. and you dont have to be at the airport 2-3 hours before, so you'll lost 60-75% of the people in the terminal already that you normally see in US/EU (30/40 mins vs 120-180 mins)

Pickles

Not to mention that everything works at HND, so you won't see the constant pileups and human traffic jams from restrictions of motion.

evergrn

I think that's a good point.

armagebedar

Japanese airports are much more efficient at passenger flow control, in my experience -- from check-in to security to boarding -- at both domestic and international terminals. Even at peak-of-peak travel periods (Golden Week, Obon, New Years) passenger movement is generally quite smooth. Compare that to airports in the US and Europe, which seem to have significant issues at all steps of this process that result in more congestion despite a similar or lower number of overall passengers.

basscadet75

Yes, I agree. I'm surprised how far JFK is down on that list now because it always feels very crowded, but that's just because everything's a mess there on an almost constant basis. (It's my home airport, so I have some experience with it.) HND, every time I've been to the domestic terminals, has actually been quite crowded, but the lines for everything are very short and move quickly. One thing is that they haven't gone batcrap insane with a dog and pony show for security, so the security lines there are always like, 4 people long and they just move constantly. No taking off shoes; I don't even remember taking my laptop out of the bag (though I may have). And they just use what looks like a standard metal detector.

One thing too is that boarding Japanese aircraft is always very fast (usually 10-15 minutes, not the 40 minutes a US airline like Delta allows), which allows for quicker departures, which allows for more departures. I'm pretty sure HND is still slot limited so not sure how much this *really* matters, but I thought it might be an unseen factor in getting passengers out of the airport quicker, making it feel less crowded despite high passenger numbers. When you've got widebodies departing every 30 minutes for most major destinations, that doesn't allow for passengers to sit milling around the airport for long.

And pre-airport check-in has been the norm there longer than it has been here, so there aren't really lines at the ticket counters. The first time I flew domestic in Japan was maybe 7-8 years ago, and I got a printed boarding pass *way* in advance, not even 24 hours in advance.

What you do see at HND is tons of people walking to and from various places, and lots and lots of people shopping for omiyage. To me it feels more similar to Tokyo Station rather than a typical international airport, especially one outside of Japan. But there are definitely a *lot* of people, they're just not all gummed up in long lines.