Ho Chi Minh City’s Upcoming Long Thanh International Airport: 5 Quick Facts

Vietnam is one of the fastest growing markets for commercial air travel. According to the Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam (CAAV), the country’s airports are expected to handle 78.3 million passengers in 2024, up 8% year-on-year. This is due to increasing international passenger traffic, which will reach 43.5 million in 2024, an increase of 33% compared to 2023. The country is also home to Southeast Asia’s busiest air route and the world’s fourth busiest, with airlines operating on the Hanoi – Ho Chi Minh City route carrying nearly 11,000,000 passengers last year.

Photo: Minh K Tran | Shutterstock

This all poses a big problem: Vietnam’s airports simply can’t keep up. Nội Bài International Airport (HAN) in the capital Hanoi was designed to handle 10 million passengers per year and currently serves 30 million passengers. To the south, the larger Tân Sơn Nhất International Airport (SGN) in Ho Chi Minh City has a capacity of 30 million passengers per year. This mark was exceeded just over a decade ago and is expected to reach 150% of capacity this year.

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Air travel between the country’s two largest cities is a clear demonstration of Vietnam’s high population density and offers numerous opportunities.

With Vietnam expected to be among the top 10 passenger-carrying countries by mid-century, it is high time to modernize its airport infrastructure. Hanoi is currently working on plans for a second airport, but Ho Chi Minh City is where the new “Jewel of Southeast Asia” is taking shape: the $20 billion Long Thanh International Airport. Let’s take a look at five key facts to inform us about what is becoming one of the world’s new mega-hubs.

Photo: Airbus

1 It will be the largest airport in Vietnam

And one of the largest in the world

Long Thanh is currently being built about 40 kilometers east of the city center on a vast site of about 100 square kilometers (40 square miles), making it more than ten times the size of the current facility at SGN. Once all phases are completed, the airport will have four parallel runways, each 4,000 meters (13,100 feet) long, and four separate terminals, each with four floors, totaling over 400,000 square meters (4.3 million square feet).

Photo: Parametric Architecture

The completed facility will be able to handle over 100 million passengers annually, which is more than double the current traffic volume at the existing Tân Sơn Nhất Airport. Crucially, the most populous city in a country that has just surpassed 100 million and is adding a million every year has plenty of room for growth in terms of building new terminals and runways.

Photo: Parametric Architecture

2 It replaces a 100-year-old facility

A small colonial airfield became a large military base

Dating back nearly a century, the existing Tân Sơn Nhất International Airport was a small airfield with a dirt runway built by the French colonial government. In the mid-1950s, a 7,200-foot runway was built, providing South Vietnam’s main international gateway to what was then Saigon. During the Vietnam War, the facility became one of the busiest military airfields in the world. From 1968 to 1974, Continental Airlines operated over 30 Boeing 707 military charters to and from the airport weekly.

Photo: Continental Archives

With the fall of Saigon, the facility was initially used as a multi-purpose airfield before being converted into today’s civilian facility. Growth was initially slow and there was only a single terminal serving fewer than 8 million passengers when an additional international terminal was added in 2007. But since then, passenger traffic has increased by more than 500% and the airport handled 41 million passengers last year, far beyond its capacity and necessitating the construction of Long Thanh.

Photo: Tân Sơn Nhất International Airport

3 The construction will take place in 3 phases

The first phase is expected to open in just over a year

Site preparation for Long Thanh officially began in January 2021, with construction of the first terminal beginning a year later. The airport will be completed in three phases:

• Phase 1 (2021-2026): The initial phase has an estimated cost of $7.8 billion and includes two of the four runways and the first terminal building, as well as land clearance for future phases. Once completed in early 2026, the facility will open with an initial annual capacity of 25 million passengers and 1.2 million tonnes of cargo.
• Phase 2 (2026-2035): Another $4.8 billion will be invested to double passenger capacity to over 50 million passengers, adding two more terminals and a third runway.
• Phase 3 (after 2035): The final phase is estimated to cost $7.2 billion. The fourth runway and terminal building will be added, increasing the total planned capacity to over 100 million passengers and 5 million tons of cargo per year.

Photo: VNA

Once Phase 1 is completed, Long Thanh is expected to operate alongside Tân Sơn Nhất. Vietnam Airlines and most international airlines flying to Vietnam will likely move to the new facility, while Tân Sơn Nhất will remain for low-cost airlines, similar to Bangkok. However, at some point Long Thanh will be able to completely replace his older brother.

Photo: VNA

4 It will be an architectural wonder

Its lotus flower shape symbolizes the culture of Vietnam

The Korean architectural firm Heerim Architects & Planners, which is responsible for the state-of-the-art Terminal 2 at Incheon International Airport in Seoul, was chosen as the design firm for Long Thanh. The Korean influence extends even further, as the Incheon Airport Consortium (a combination of Incheon International Airport Corporation of Korea and PMI Consulting of Vietnam) has been hired to manage airport operations.

Photo: Parametric Architecture

Heerim selected a design for each terminal shaped like a lotus flower, the national flower of Vietnam, after extensive feedback from the Vietnamese public and local experts. As Heerim describes it:

“The design of Long Thanh International Airport is inspired by the beautiful lotus shape, which symbolizes the elegance, strength and warm culture of the Vietnamese people. It is characterized by a high level of sophistication in both aesthetic and functional terms, utilizing the world’s best technology and airport design knowledge and the seamless integration of Vietnamese cultural elements into the country’s new gateway to the world.

5 It will have excellent connectivity

Despite the distance, there are good connections to the city center

The only downside to Long Thanh is that it is about 40 kilometers (25 miles) from the center of Ho Chi Minh City, which already suffers from significant traffic congestion. That’s why airport planners have come up with a number of ground transportation options to avoid possible two-hour commutes to the new airport:

• High speed train: A new high-speed train will connect the airport as part of the Ho Chi Minh City-Nha Trang section of the North-South High-Speed ​​Railway. The railway will run underground through the central axis of the airport, with the airport having its own train station.
• Light rail: A light rail line connecting the airport to Thu Thiem, east of Ho Chi Minh City, is being planned and construction is scheduled for 2025-2030. Trains with a top speed of 80 km/h (50 mph) take travelers to the city center in just over half an hour.
• Streets: The airport is already accessible via the Ho Chi Minh City–Long Thanh–Dau Giay expressway. An additional road is planned to the east of the airport to connect to the Dau Giay-Phan Thiet expressway.

Photo: NetZeroVN

Expect excitement to build as the countdown to the opening on Long Thanh begins, and stay tuned to Simple Flying as we’ll keep you updated on the latest developments.