Malta rated Europe's 4th best airport

[Final 3 Greens]

According to the Airports Council International ASQ survey published on 16 Feb, the top 5 airports in Europe were

1 - Keflavik
2 - Zurich
3 - Oporto
4 - Malta
5 - Southampton

Well done Malta and also Southampton, for showing that small can be beautiful.

[TightSlot]

Where's LHR?

[Final 3 Greens]

They only published the top 5.

[Fargoo]

Best worldwide

BEST AIRPORTS WORLDWIDE
1) Incheon (ICN) 2) Singapore (SIN) 3) Hong Kong (HKG) 4) Beijing (PEK) 5) Hyderabad (HYD)

full press release

http://www.airports.org/aci/aci/file/Press%20Releases/2010/PR_160210_ASQ%2BAwards_final.pdf

[dubh12000]

LHR is most likely 6th......


*can't decide on smiley*

[PilotsOfTheCaribbean]

The Airports council International being a subscription body for Airport operators. Psuedo awards for their own membership. Presumably it makes the winning members buy a table at the award ceremony they organise for themselves?

Lovely as it is, what are they the top 5 airports in, other than fairly sleepy backwaters in global aviation terms?

[Old Photo.Fanatic]

At the risk of incurring the wrath of a Mod.!!!!!

Heathrow is west of London near where the A30 and the A4 meet.

Sorry,just could'nt resist this one.
With tongue in cheek etc.....

OPF

[ConstantFlyer]

According to the press release, the airports were judged on these factors:


Ten factors identified as essential for high customer service ratings are, by order of importance: the ambience of the airport, cleanliness of the terminal, comfort of the waiting areas, availability of washrooms, cleanliness of washrooms, courtesy and helpfulness of the airport staff, business lounges, ease of making connections, passport / ID inspection experience and good shopping facilities.


They must have had some very eager survey compilers at Southampton, or they were just very lucky not to have encountered me. I would have scored their survey questions as follows:

My score for Southampton
the ambience of the airport......2 out of 10 (glorified tin shed)
cleanliness of the terminal........5 out of 10 (tidy but worn)
comfort of the waiting areas.....3 out of 10 (too few seats for pax)
availability of washrooms..........8 out of 10 (sufficient)
cleanliness of washrooms..........5 out of 10 (far from sparkling)
courtesy and helpfulness of the airport staff..5(OK but most disinterested)
business lounges.....................4 out of 10 (just one small one)
ease of making connections......3 out of 10 (no airside transfers)
passport/ID inspection experience..9 o/o 10 (ppts OK but security surly)
good shopping facilities............1 out of 10 (tiny shop; grim restaurant - admittedly it's being reburbished, but service and quality are poor)

As far as LHR is concerned, I don't think the survey will have recorded minus scores....!

What do us forum users think are the real best airports, though?

[PAXboy]

Amusing scores, ConstantFlyer. It reads just like it's a BAA plc airport. :rolleyes:

Oh, it is ... :}

Small? There's a place in South Africa that's neat and easy and chilled out but big? You know, the ghastly Johannesburg International is getting really much better. When they have finished their building works for some football game that's going to be played there, I think their international terminal will score highly. Last August, it beat LHR T5 with ease.

[Final 3 Greens]

My score for Malta

the ambience of the airport......8 out of 10 (light and airy)
cleanliness of the terminal........9 out of 10 (always clean)
comfort of the waiting areas.....9 out of 10 (plenty of seats for pax)
availability of washrooms..........8 out of 10 (sufficient)
cleanliness of washrooms..........9 out of 10 (always clean)
courtesy and helpfulness of the airport staff...(Typically Maltese, helpful & friendly)
business lounges.....................9 out of 10 (brand new lounge in 2009, light and airy, plenty of space, free internet, free food, good arrivals lounge)
ease of making connections......8 out of 10 (never done it, but it looks well organised)
passport/ID inspection experience..9 o/o 10 (fast and efficient)
good shopping facilities............6 out of 10 (limited range of shops, but high quality and reasonable value, good eating places)

As a regular user, the MIA experience is fast and generally pain free.

One other user on here recalled how he arrived at -10 mins (due to an incident) and still made the flight.

I usually allow an hour and have plenty of time to use the lounge before boarding.

#4 seems fair enough to me, also pleased to see ZRH at #2, an excellent airport I use regularly.

[Two-Tone-Blue]

@ Constantflyer My score for Southampton
the ambience of the airport......2 out of 10 (glorified tin shed)

Some of us remember when it was one!!

[ulxima]

Both F3G and ConstantFlyer rate 8 out of 10 as "sufficient".
I would have said that 8 out 10 is "good" but now I think I am missing something in terms of English definition.

Given a rate from 0 to 10 how do you define a number rate (or a set of numbers) in words?
I mean:
- anything below 5 (therefore 0 to 4) is "insufficient"
- 5 is "average"
- 6 is "sufficient"
- 7 is "fair"
and so on.
The above is just an example, not really sure that 7 and fair can go together :E

How do you do it?
Thank you.

Ciao
Ulxima

[Final 3 Greens]

Fair point Ulxima.

I cut and pasted Constant Travellers score table and didn't edit the descriptor.

They always say that when using a Likert scale (e.g. 1-10) it is best not to use narrative beyond 1 = lower, 1 - higher, or words to that effect.

You have just lucidly demonstrated why.

Ciao ciao (usually said this way on the islands!)

[MainDude]

Yesterday, 19:42 * #5 (permalink)
dubh12000
*
Join Date: Feb 2008
Location: Zurich
Posts: 178
LHR is most likely 6th......


*can't decide on smiley*
*


yea, 6th last!

[Scumbag O'Riley]

Hard to take these surveys totally seriously as they are hardly rigourous and depend on passengers who have only been to half a dozen airports in their life so don't know what to compare with. People may also grade depending on how their journey to the airport went and that is not something that can be affected by the airport itself. Very easy to rubbish these surveys. Unless LHR comes bottom when it should be published in Nature :) Suspect also that in this grade-inflation world we now live in that a 9 is an average score and you need a 10* if you want to impress.

I cannot think of any airport in the world that I would score more than a 7/10 on anything, but then when I were a lad a C grade was something to be proud of.......

[Final 3 Greens]

Scumbag

This survey has very high face validity.

I think ZRH and MLA are great airports.

Therefore the survey must be true.

[neroliie]

What do us forum users think are the real best airports, though?

I'm partial to Schiphol but I'm biased and it's the closest major airport in the country to me :ok: Heathrow I used to like very much, but I haven't been there in a while so perhaps it's changed. In any event I preferred T4 to the others which felt awfully cramped.

Ashamed to say I don't remember Malta at all :ugh:

Gatwick, Birmingham, Southampton - nondescript :rolleyes:

Exeter and Bristol - cute little things that do their best really hard. I have to try extra to not be a snob and compare them with the bigger operations out there :\

Hong Kong is, in my view, awesome! :D Free wifi all over the place! Ok, it didn't always work, but that was probably due to my clapped out laptop.

Manila I like very much in a different way. It's not slick like I perhaps expect airports in Europe to be, but everyone's very friendly (sometimes to a fault).

JFK felt like a graveyard. Or maybe it's always like that on 1st April? :( Seriously, it was almost as though there were half a dozen pax at check-in and security, and then everyone just disappeared. And then I got teased by the security people just before the gate because of my accent (who knew the way I pronounce 'aluminium' could cause such hilarity?).

Newark - unfriendly ladies working at the desk just after baggage-pickup. And it felt like you had to walk forever to get there. Probably no longer than anywhere else, but for some reason it felt that way.

Detroit - big, dark, noisy (I'd just got off a flight from AMS and was knackered :} ). But that indoor train thingy taking you to the more distant gates was FUN :E

Uh, I could go on but dinner's nearly ready ;) On balance I'd say my 'favourite' is a toss-up between Schiphol and Hong Kong :ok:

[Two-Tone-Blue]

I forgot to mention that MLA also has separate facilities for smokers!!

I know I'm one of the 'dirty people', but it does reduce stress.

And they offer that facility at Dulles as well.

[ulxima]

I think ZRH and MLA are great airports.
Therefore the survey must be true.


Ipse Dixit :E

However I agree with you on ZRH. I like it too.
Never been in MLA but I trust what you wrote.

Ciao ciao then (it is also widely used on the mainland :))
Ulxima

[ulxima]

And they offer that facility at Dulles as well


...and HKG, AMS, GOT, ARN, ZRH, BSL, SHA, PVG, PEK, etc.

I saw these separate areas for the first time at Changi in late nineties but I am not sure they have been the first.

Ciao
Ulxima

[L'aviateur]

Hong Kong, Singapore and Amsterdam amongst my favourits for efficiency . Although have to say that I was surprised to discover that Singapore Changi has a budget terminal after taxying in on a LCC a little while back and finding myself inside a large shed with a long queue for immigration in the corner of the airport, vast difference to the main terminal.

[Sark]

Surely Vancouver must rate highly lots of light, space and the water features are quite spectacular and calming. Too much walking on transfer but I am young and fit! Relaxed security and Customs and Immigration even during the Olympics last week. I would score all at 9 out of 10.

PS: LHR Terminal 3 has improved 10 fold over the last 3 years since we last used it.

[Pontius Navigator]

We used to use the cafe at Luqa for lunch as they had superb spag-bol. One day, while 4 of us were tucking in to the spag-bol the 5th had chosen the maccaroni.

When he nipped off to the toilet someone noticed a fly on his macaroni. Knowing how fastideous he was, the fly was picked off and no one said a thing.

A couple of mouthfuls later we noticed a second fly IN his macaroni. At that point someone threw up and we all departed :}

[TheTiresome1]

PN - Malta has flies. You just have to get used to it. :)

[Final 3 Greens]

Arrived back at MIA at 1am this morning, had a Kinnie in the arrivals lounge, got my 2 checked bags and was in bed by 1.30am.

The ease of getting though is one reason why people like the Malta experiencet.

Admittedly, last night was a good as it gets, with ours being the only flight arriving at that time, but nonetheless it's a quick airport to use.

[Nobend]

MYY Miri Sarawak definitely up there for speed especially the 0620 to KUL. The MAS desks don't open until 0530 so its check, up the stairs, 2 minutes through immigration (strange one that because Sarawak is Malaysia), on to the aircraft and orf you go.

Another thing..... no boogering about with liquids. I suspect you could take a 40 gallon drum of water on with you and no one would bat an eyelid :ok:

[xtypeman]

OK cat among the pigeons. LHR T5 last time i arrived there at 18:00 on a satelite was landside with bags in 20 mins.

[Final 3 Greens]

LHR T5 last time i arrived there at 18:00 on a satelite was landside with bags in 20 mins.

Same thing for me on Wednesday last week, arriving at 1130.

Should be like that all the time, then LHR might figure in the list.

[Capetonian]

I don't want to repeat what others have said, so I'll restrict myself to saying that having flown in and out of Malta earlier this month, on Air Malta, I was most pleasantly impressed by all aspects of the airport, and the airline.

I also found the island and its people fascinating and delightful.

F3G I'll be sending you a PM when I have a bit more time.

[Peter47]

I agree with the results, HKG & SIN are great airports (I've not been through SEL), ZRH & AMS are the best in Europe. Actually it is airline not airport surveys where I sometimes disagree with the results.

LHR is better now that T5 has opened. It wan't a bad airport but it was operating way over capacity, terminals congested with passengers and certainly in my experience you had long waits to get onto a stand at T4. At times you thought yourself lucky if you got a remote stand with coaches waiting.

If you asked people to list their favourite and least favorite airports LHR would probably appear on both lists (a bit like Margaret Thatcher when PM). Favourite because of the range of flights, least favourite because of the congestion. The airlines want to go there because the yields are higher which suggests that premium travellers at least like the airport, or ais it that the alternatives (possibly excluding LCY) worse?

[UPP]

F3G.

Agree with you about MLA. I'll be there next week. Arriving is always good. They are excellent with the wheelchair assistance, always waiting for us, and friendly.

Funny thing is that when I go back KM116, I always seem to get a grumpy check in agent. Still, it is early in the morning, and it's more amusing than anything else.

I seem to be in a minority, but I preferred the old lounge by Gate 1 - all that wood panelling made it nice and quiet. And with the new one, it can get a bit warm with the sun shining through that big window. Fish are nice, though!

[Final 3 Greens]

Fish are nice, though!

How did you have, grilled or fried :E

I'll be on 116 on Tuesday morning myself, back Friday night.

Some of the check in staff are grumpy, agreed, don't know why - I have a couple of 'full and frank' conversations over the years :ouch:

It's not really the Maltese way to be grumpy :confused:

Hope you have a good trip (are you coming home or going abroad for a break?)

[UPP]

Going for 2 weeks next thursday. I would live there if I could. I have far more Maltese friends than here in the UK. Used to stay at the Jerma, but not now, obviously, so we're at the Marina at St Georges Bay these days' Lot of the old Jerma staff there, so that's good.

The grumpiness of the staff does usually make me laugh, because it really is so unusual.

Those fish are something else....wonder if they'd notice.......nah!

Always fly KM too. It's always a nice thought to look out of the lounge window at LGW and see the plane at the stand.

As an aside, I hope the arrival back at tLGW is better than last time: We waited for one hour (about 10 of us in all) stuck in a corridor for the assistance buggies to arrive. That certainly wouldn't have happened at MLA.

[tom775257]

Good for Malta international. I have spent many an hour in LMML as pilot and passenger, always good. (Ex KM pilot). Good ops side and a good ATC/handling/engineering etc.

Malta, my home away from home, with my Maltese fiancee (ps you would see her on TVM thursday nights :ok: )