9 million citizens, 9 million departures: Ben-Gurion Airport is straining under the load – even if it does offer a barometer of the national mood ■ Haaretz paid a visit, no airfare required
Unlike the late singer-songwriter Meir Ariel and his classic “Terminal Luminalt,” no doctor ever recommended that I take a monthly visit to the airport – but it is good for me.
A few visits I’ve made in recent weeks – just to check out the airport itself, without flying anywhere – confirmed the truth in the words an airport workers said to me: “They used to talk about the water level in the Sea of Galilee every day. That was the national index. Now we are at the heart of the Israeli ethos. This is where you measure the national mood.” If that’s the case, the mood last week was pretty good.
Each of the previous two days had seen 80,000 passengers at the airport to the east of Tel Aviv. At the height of summer, the daily number will reach 100,000 on some 600 flights. That’s a takeoff or landing every two and a half minutes, on average. All told, 25 million people will pass through Ben-Gurion Airport this year, landing and taking off. These numbers set a new record for this hive of activity.
When Terminal 3 was inaugurated, almost 20 years ago, it was said to have capacity for up to 12 million passengers a year – less than half the current number. When we reach that number, they told us back in 2004, another international airport will have been built by then. Meanwhile, millions of shekels have been sunk into creating faraway Eilat’s Ramon Airport, which was never intended to meet the international need in the first place and so changes nothing about the Ben-Gurion problem.
As of now, the location of a second international airport, which (nearly) everyone agrees must be built, has yet to be chosen. The deliberations between Nevatim in the Negev and a northern location, perhaps in the vicinity of Ramat David, is ongoing. The pressure campaigns are in full roar. Haifa, it seems, has missed an obvious opportunity of becoming home to Israel’s second airport.
As abroad as it gets
A look at the number of Israelis flying abroad reveals astonishing data. A country that has some 9 million citizens will see some 9 million overseas departures this year. Of course, this figure is misleading as some will fly abroad 10 times while others won’t fly even once. Over 90 percent of overseas departures take place through Ben-Gurion Airport. The rest go through overland border crossings or at seaports (according to Central Bureau of Statistics data).
Citizens of other countries travel just as much, but by other means. Israel is not the record holder in this category. The United Kingdom had some 66 million citizens in 2018, yet registered 70 million overseas departures. Ireland (population: 4.8 million) had 8.3 million overseas departures. Italy (60 million) had 66 million departures.
The clear difference is that in Italy, 41 million people left their borders by car or train; only 25 million departed by plane. In addition, Italy has 12 large international airports while Israel has one (Ramon Airport barely serves Israeli passengers at all). The UK has 23 international airports, France 21, Greece 15, Austria six and Sweden five.
There are also countries with strikingly lower figures: The United States has over 327 million citizens, but racked up only 158 million overseas departures. In Japan, that number was 19 million overseas departures in a population of 127 million.
Data published by the World Bank, in cooperation with the World Tourism Organization, examined the international vacation habits of Europeans: In the Britain, the Netherlands, Germany and Austria, the figures show one departure abroad per capita on average. Spain and Portugal average 0.3 overseas trips and France 0.4. The European high point is found in Sweden, where each citizen vacations abroad 1.5 times per year, on average.
All this data leads to one obvious conclusion: The situation in which an entire country passes through a single airport is completely unreasonable. You can call it crazy or stupid. There is certainly no logic or reasonable planning here. Nine million people cannot be happy with a single international airport, and its collapse under the strain is surely only a matter of time.
Why do Israelis love to fly abroad so much? The answers are well-known: We live in a small, isolated, overcrowded and, most of all, horribly expensive country. For the price of a two-day vacation in Israel, you can have a great week on a Greek island with remote beaches. The need to get away for a bit leads us all to Ben-Gurion Airport.
Transportation Minister Miri Regev may have proclaimed magnanimously the other week that she has “instructed all agencies to prepare to provide optimal service to the traveling public. I wish everyone an enjoyable vacation and a good flight.” But skeptics worry that last year’s horrible congestion might strike again.
Israel Airports Authority announced a week before our visit that it has prepared for the intake of passengers through a massive recruitment drive. Thus, for instance, “family rangers” will ease the passage of families with children through security checks and check-in. The security hall has new options, including a fast track check-in for those with only hand luggage who have checked in from home, on all airlines. The passenger hall has new self-serve kiosks to print a destination tag for your luggage and send it directly onto the plane.
This all sounds great, but on my recent visit I saw lines. They looked long but reasonable, not unusual, but we’re still yet to hit summer getaway season. Those standing on them looked stressed.
If people were asked to name two leading Israeli architects, the ones they might suggest are Moshe Safdie and Ram Karmi. That’s the correct answer for Terminal 3 as well. The firm of Ram Karmi and his sister Ada Karmi-Melamede (in collaboration with Lishar-Eldar Architects) designed the arrivals hall, while Safdie designed the departure hall and duty-free mall.
Almost 20 years after inauguration, the building still looks in relatively good condition and the planning almost rational. The walking distances are still immense, but the joy this offers those passing the Via Dolorosa of security checks, to the point of striding down to the duty-free shops, makes us think it’s a wonderful building.
Somewhat surprisingly, the water still rains down from the top of the departure hall’s water feature. The ceiling is still a sort of bowl that drains the water to flow into a little pool in the middle of the hall. Those seated around the waterfall are too busy to wonder what’s going on. Almost 20 years ago, I bet against this feature surviving. I was wrong.
I’ve recently seen photographs of a terminal at Singapore Changi Airport, where Safdie used a very similar feature but on a truly immense scale. The hall there is full of trees, and the water flowing from the ceiling seems like a jungle’s irrigation system. Somehow, that makes more sense. At Ben-Gurion, it’s still bizarre.
The art of the ‘grand boulevard’
The 180-meter (590-foot) walk between passport control and the duty-free shops is the happiest part of the terminal. Those departing stroll downhill, free of all burdens. This is where their vacation begins. Those arriving walk in the opposite direction, also downhill. They may look with a certain wistfulness at the departees, but they are glad that their wearying journey is now behind them.
The latest innovation on this ‘grand boulevard’ is a giant mural (44 meters long and 5 meters tall) that was unveiled last month. This is the first impression tourists now get of Israel – and first impressions matter, of course. The painting is called “Am Israel Chai” (“The People of Israel Live”) and it seeks to capture 4,000 years of biblical, Jewish and Israeli history – from Adam in the right-hand corner to Benjamin Netanyahu on the left. The creator is Mexican artist Julio Carrasco Bretón. The ILAN organization, dedicated to strengthening ties between Israel and Latin America, donated the painting to Israel to mark its 75th year of independence.
Such murals are a venerated Mexican tradition. I once spent hours in Mexico City admiring the fascinating murals of Diego Rivera (Frida Kalo’s communist partner). Last week, observing Bretón’s immense painting, I was less impressed. The colorful work is a kind of quiz, challenging observers to try to identify the figures.
On the day of my visit, most arriving passengers barely gave it a glance. Few stopped or took pictures. Most hurried to collect their luggage and get out of there.
On the right-hand side of the painting – meaning the more ancient part – you can probably guess who King David, Abraham, Noah with his ark, and Moses with the tablets are. Then the quiz gets harder: Is that Shimon Bar Kochba? Perhaps Judah Maccabee? And that’s probably Eliezer Ben Yehuda, and then come Theodor Herzl and Ze’ev Jabotinsky, followed by David Ben-Gurion, Moshe Dayan and Yitzhak Rabin.
With the contemporary figures, the problem is somewhat different – they look a bit cartoonish. I imagine singer Yehoram Gaon is happy to be there, but less thrilled with how he is depicted. Gymnast Linoy Ashram is a hundred times lovelier in the flesh than in this painting. Chemist Ada Yonath looks great, as do writers Amos Oz and A. B. Yehoshua. The one above them is probably musician Naomi Shemer. You’d have to be blind not to recognize Noa Kirel. Netanyahu may not look good, but he’s planted next to Menachem Begin, who’s beside Shimon Peres, with a peace dove between them. Directly underneath Netanyahu’s image in the mural is an actual firefighting cabinet, with extinguishers and hoses. No irony intended.
The more interesting art on this boulevard runs in the other direction. Departees pass by an exhibit documenting 75 years of Israeli statehood alongside 100 years since the birth of Yitzhak Rabin. Much has already been written on the omission of Rabin’s murder from the exhibit, but the photos that are included are excellent.
Arriving passengers are greeted at the southern end of the boulevard by three mosaic boards. The top one (Beit She’an, fifth century) depicts birds wearing ribbons bearing the Greek inscription “Blessed are you in coming, and blessed are you in leaving.” The lower board holds a mosaic floor from sixth-century Caesarea. To the left is a long board with a mosaic floor from the moshav Bethlehem of Galilee.
The Cognac index
There are plenty of eateries, cafés and fast food counters at Terminal 3, but no restaurants. A few large chains operate, as in any mall. Alongside them you will find less ubiquitous companies like the La Farina bakery chain, selling sandwiches and soft drinks in two locations, and the British-owned Camden Food, operating a café in one of the departure hall wings. I ate a tasty gouda sandwich for 35 shekels ($9.50) and a carbonated drink for 15 shekels. The coffee is actually cheaper: 12 shekels for a latte.
The quality of service is a fascinating issue. At counters with no line, I received excellent, courteous and charming service. But the moment two people lined up behind me, the experience became agitated and rushed.
Passage through the terminal takes hours. It’s natural for most who come here to buy coffee. The big change that has taken place in recent years is that many passengers purchase a sandwich and soft drink in the terminal to take on board the plane. As a result, the food business here is booming. The best proof of that is that the Airports Authority has announced pans to double the food court spaces over the next three years. The authority also announced that in an effort to lower food prices, the concession holders must commit to competitive target prices.
The duty-free section has a problem. A brief examination finds, for instance, that a bottle of Hennessy VSOP Cognac costs $90 at Ben-Gurion. Yet the price at the Sar Hamashkaot chain is identical (according to their website). It’s a similar story when checking the price of Rémy Martin Cognac. In fact, the duty-free prices are slightly higher than at regular stores. I have no idea how that’s possible, but it certainly doesn’t encourage people to shop at the airport.
The Efi Nave gate
A friend arriving as a tourist from Berlin told me last week that following his arrival, a female passport control officer bombarded him with questions, including one she didn’t find invasive at all: “In your hometown, do you live alone or with a partner?” This was followed by “What’s their name?” He was never asked such a thing anywhere else, he says.
It’s impossible to avoid noticing the huge gap that has developed in recent years for arriving Israelis and foreigners. The first group scan their passports in the automatic machines and quickly proceed. In the compound where the overseas tourists undergo passport checks, long and oppressive lines wind on and on. It’s hard to make a good first impression if, straight after the long mural featuring the prophet Isaiah, you reach a line like this.
Security innovations include the installation of conveyor belts connected to HBS (Hold Baggage Screening) systems – an automatic security check system for luggage that uses advanced technology to check the luggage with no need to open the suitcase.
None of this, of course, means that anyone will ever stop asking the all-important question: “Did you pack alone?” These new methods – and this is always the thing with security systems – come in addition to the good old ways, not in place of them.
At some points you have to walk through automatic gates, which open via a unique ticket or your passport (both upon departure and after landing). At one of these, my hosts pointed out to me the specific place where former Israel Bar Association President Efi Nave was caught and disgraced when sneakily trying to take his girlfriend on vacation with him unrecorded.
You can’t go through one of these gates today without recalling the images of Nave and his partner, squeezing together like a pair of crooks to slip by using only a single pass. Observing the multitudes incessantly passing through the gates, one can only appreciate the efforts of the low-level worker who noticed the violation.
Night owls
Unlike many foreign airports, where quiet is maintained for longer hours, Ben-Gurion Airport takes a minimalist approach to the matter. Landings are permitted throughout the night. Takeoffs, which create far more noise, are halted only from 1 to 5:30 A.M. Overseas airlines are in love with this arrangement: it allows them to land here at night, take off for Europe at dawn, and place the aircraft at the disposal of other continental routes at a reasonable morning hour. The residents of the greater Tel Aviv region are less enamored with all this hustle and bustle.
Up in smoke
Over the past five years, smoking has been banned throughout the terminal. The glass boxes from which smokers used to happily gaze at the outside world are gone. But it’s complicated. The Airports Authority is considering bringing the smoking zones back, letting smokers breathe in the kind of air they like.
It transpires that they simply can’t keep up with the flying public’s nicotine cravings. The result is a plethora of smoking violations in prohibited zones – or, in other words, a decree the public cannot follow.
I just threw something on
In the past, people would really dress up for a flight; it was a festive occasion. Nowadays, the opposite happens as travelers make a point of showing up wearing their most relaxed attire. Shorts, tank tops and flip-flops appeared the required dress code for an outbound flight at Ben-Gurion Airport last week. It highlighted the immense gap between the air crews, decked out in their smart suits, ties and hats, and the crowd trundling along, dragging its feet in a T-shirt reading “East or West, Bro, You’re the Best – bootcamp August ’96.”
The thought of what might happen when dress codes among air crew are changed to match those of their clientele horrifies me.
Come one, come all
In the past, the average departing traveler was accompanied by six companions (family or friends). Today, the average stands at three per passenger. The arrivals hall last week was packed and loud. People stood there with large, heart-shaped balloons. Others stood with flowers or signs in Cyrillic stating things I couldn’t understand.
There was also one family with custom-made shirts reading “Our Liron, how we waited.” A dozen or so of Liron’s loved ones showed up at the airport: one had a drum, another blew a sort of toy trumpet. Liron came out, dragging a heavy knapsack, and seemed exhausted and embarrassed. A moment later, she vanished in a sea of hugs.
A point of view
Ben-Gurion Airport’s observation terrace was built five years ago and is located at the western end of the airport compound, near parking lot 26 and far removed from Terminal 3 and the center of action. It’s easy to get there and parking is free, but the experience is not exactly an uplifting one.
It’s a low porch, a bit threadbare, located between warehouses, and you can only see departures westward. Most landings take place quite far away, at the eastern end of the airport. And yet on several visits there I met thrilled families with excited children, who jumped on the terrace and screamed: “Look Dad! A plane!”