As United Airlines launches its Haneda flight to Guam, get to know Haneda airport
BY JULIAN RYALL Japan Correspondent
TOKYO — Ask any frequent visitor to Tokyo which of the city’s two airports they would prefer to arrive at or depart from and you are pretty much guaranteed to get the same reply: Haneda International.
That is not to say that Narita International is not a decent airport, but the biggest drawback that it faces is the distance from the city center. It is a little more than 72km from Narita to Tokyo Station, with the Keisei Skyliner train taking 45 minutes to complete the journey. Haneda, on the other hand, is 18km away and a train or monorail will whisk you into the city in around 20 minutes.
Haneda Airfield opened in 1931 as the first air facility serving Tokyo. Serving the outposts of the Japanese empire, it operated flights to Taiwan and the Korean Peninsula, as well as the puppet state of Manchuko. The airfield expanded rapidly in the pre-war years and served as a key base for the Japanese military during the conflict.
Expansion continued after the war, with flag carrier Japan Airlines commencing domestic operations in 1951. In the 1960s, however, it was recognized that the growing importance of air travel meant that Haneda would need to be dramatically expanded. Its location alongside Tokyo Bay made expansion of Haneda technically challenging and the government decided to construct a completely new airport at Narita, west of Tokyo.
Edo Street at Haneda International Airport offers various dining options. Photo courtesy of Japan Airport Terminal Co. Ltd. The New Tokyo International Airport opened at Narita in 1978 and Haneda was relegated to largely serving domestic routes. Within a decade, however, it was clear that rapidly expanding international business and growing domestic demand for international travel meant that Narita would not be able to meet the needs of Tokyo.
Plans to extend runways to allow larger aircraft to land and for the construction of additional runways met fierce resistance from local residents and the government began to turn its eyes back to Haneda. New land reclamation technologies made expanding into Tokyo Bay feasible and a new 9,800-foot runway was opened on reclaimed land at Haneda in 1988. Two more runways were completed, in 1997 and 2000, bringing the total to four, and the aging terminal building was replaced with a state-of-the-art facility.
Today, Haneda provides a seamless transition into and out of Japan, with clear signage, superb facilities and efficient immigration, customs and baggage-handling at its three terminals. Terminal 1 and the domestic flight areas of Terminal 2 are open from 5 a.m. to 12 a.m., while Terminal 3 and the international flight area of Terminal 2 operate 24 hours a day.
United Airlines presently operates out of Terminal 3, with seven flights a day to Los Angeles and three a day to Chicago and San Francisco. It also has two daily flights to Washington Dulles and one to New York.
And as of May 1, it will have a daily flight between Haneda and Guam.
United Airlines operates daily flights from Narita to Los Angeles, San Francisco, Denver, New York and Houston. It also has regular flights on the Guam and Saipan routes.
Haneda’s Terminal 3 is spread out over five floors, with shuttle buses and city taxis available on the first floor and the arrivals lobby on the second floor. The Keikyu Line rail link and the Tokyo Monorail can be accessed on both the second and third floors. Departures is on the third floor, while anyone with some time before a flight can explore the restaurants and shops on the fourth and fifth levels.
Dining options in what is known as Edo Street include soba noodles, ramen and sushi, as well as a Chinese restaurant and Western outlets.
And while Japanese airports are gradually catching on to the idea that airports are ideal places to have lots of shops as they have a captive audience and people want to spend their last few notes of local currency, neither Haneda nor Narita have a selection of stores comparable to London, Dubai or Singapore. There are around a dozen shops before the security check and immigration procedures, most selling tourist trinkets, such as key chain holders in the shape of sushi or socks with images of Mount Fuji.
For anyone travelling with children, the best way to while away the time before a flight is to take them to the fifth-floor roof observation deck, with a panoramic view across the entire airport as well as out across Tokyo Bay and, if the weather is clear, you can even see the Tokyo SkyTree towering over northern Tokyo.
After completing the security check, there are more cafes and restaurants serving snacks, but here the shops are primarily high-end clothing, shoes, jewelry and watches, as well as alcoholic drinks, tobacco products and perfumes.
“Yoii flight-o” — or have a good flight, as they say at Haneda.
