Watch: Bengaluru airport’s new terminal gives an ‘immersive garden’ experience

The video claims that the terminal, which replicates elevated walkways, gardens, artificial waterfalls and green seating areas in the interior and the exterior, is designed to deliver “the most memorable and meaningful garden experience in the world”.

Also tagged as ‘innovative and sustainable,’ the new airport terminal will comprise two levels – all arrivals at the ground floor while departure gates will be on the first floor.

Termed ‘innovative and sustainable,’ the new airport terminal will comprise two levels. Photo/Special Arrangement

The other amenities that KIA’s T2 will offer include a multi-level car parking area and a lagoon for water recycling, apart from a multi-modal transport hub aligned to the main entrance, to which a metro station built by Namma Metro will offer connectivity to and from Bengaluru city.

Taking a step towards sustainability, the entire terminal roof will house solar panels to generate energy covering over 70 per cent usage of the airport.

According to the vision video, an in-built smartphone application will help passengers guide their way through the terminal, offer additional information on the amenities available and even the birds that fly within the garden-airport premises.

Transparent window columns placed at sunlight-facing areas will enhance the naturally-lit terminal during the day while face-recognition and fingerprint sensors used in the airport will offer seamless passage before boarding and after deboarding flights at KIA.

An aerial view of T2, Kempegowda International Airport. Photo/ Special Arrangement

Earlier, the Bengaluru International Airport Limited (BIAL), the company which operates the airport, had announced that a “calming and immersive garden experience” awaits commuters in near future as the video rightly indicates throughout its runtime.

As many as 7,095 trees and shrubs in the path of the expansion for the construction of Terminal 2 at KIA, will be safely translocated to other locations within the airport premises in a phased manner, according to BIAL. This is done as part of “further enhancing the landscape all the way from the Trumpet to the Terminal,” a BIAL statement reads.

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To ensure high survival rates for translocated trees, BIAL has engaged the Institute of Wood Science & Technology and Volvo to provide scientific solutions.”

“Some of the existing trees are unique species and not available in India. Our aim is to ensure that we don’t lose out on the existing ones. In keeping with Bengaluru’s image as the Garden City of India, BIAL has tried to reflect this image at the Airport by creating world-class landscapes,” Tom Shimmin, Chief Projects Officer, BIAL told Indianexpress.com.

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Construction and development work for T2 is in progress with BIAL spending around Rs 13,000 crores. The first phase of the project is expected to be completed by March 2021. The first phase of the new terminal, according to BIAL’s vision document, will have a capacity to hold 25 million passengers per annum.

The connectivity for the airport to the city is also set to improve as Namma Metro’s airport line is expected to be ready by 2023. A 25-minute suburban rail link from the city is also expected to commence operations by the first half of 2020.