T4 was built supposedly to replace the older T4 as a "bigger" budget terminal. But the high cost of building the T4 at half a billion dollars to initially more to cater for budget airlines is too costly and even as a "experimental" full self service terminal. It was suppose to cater for mainly budget airlines and then for Tiger but even then Tiger and now Scoot never use the terminal at all and mainly caters to Air Asia with the most flights.
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Shortage of widebody gates at T4
During my drive to Changi in the evening, I noticed Vietnam Airlines A350 being parked at remote aprons near the PIE exit. Upon checking flight VN656 to Ho Chi Minh City (SGN) departing 20:45 has been assigned to gate H1 or H2 (remote gates in T4).
It become apparent that there are 5 widebody arrivals to T4 during 18:00 - 21:00 period:
1. 18:25 CX735 which will overnight and depart next day 08:00 as CX710
2. 19:10 CX635 which will depart 20:10 as CX636
3. 19:15 VN657 which will depart 20:45 as VN656
4. 19:55 KE643 which will depart 22:35 as KE644
5. 20:35 CX711 which will overnight and depart next day 09:50 as CX658
I wonder why flight CX735 wasn't immediately towed away to make way for VN657? But then again 50 minutes may not be enough to turn around the aircraft. Besides there should be allowance for late arrival of CX735 or early arrival of VN657 which would render no gates available anyway.
Maybe a miscalculated steps by Changi and VN to have VN migrate to T4 without anticipating operational requirement changes with the introduction of widebody VN flight to Changi.
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I guess this needs further observation.
But I guess it would have been better to have CX735 use the remote gates instead, unless there's some sort of an agreement or something between Cathay and CAG to guarantee a jetbridge for all Cathay flights?
And I guess some narrowbody operators at other terminals should be given "incentives" to move to T4 as well.an infrastructure geek
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I agree that it's better to move smaller airlines with narrowbodies like Bangkok Airways, Lao Airlines, IndiGo, and probably some airlines with small operations at SIN that definitely won't bring widebodies.
ABout the VN situation, I guess CAG and VN themselves didn't expect that they'll do widebody flights into SIN in the future. There's no other way to accommodate these widebodies, thus remote stands. The reason behind moving KE and VN from T3 to T4 is to reduce congestion at T3 so I don't see any possibility they will reverse this decision.Last edited by maxc_20; 8 May 2019, 01:42 AM.
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Originally posted by maxc_20 View PostI agree that it's better to move smaller airlines with narrowbodies like Bangkok Airways, Lao Airlines, IndiGo, and probably some airlines with small operations at SIN that definitely won't bring widebodies.
Maybe Indigo is an ideal candidate to vacate T2 to T4. But then again T2 will probably be under utilised with Scoot moving to T1 come end of the year. T4 now lacks the F&B options for Indian vegetarian which are plentiful in T2.
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If T2 usage is a problem, maybe Lion Air Group can go there instead, and allow SQ to fully concentrate its ops on T3.
Having them (and Garuda) in T3 is quite inefficient since T3 doesn't have MARS gates AFAIK. But I'd argue that T4 would be better placed to absorb both AirAsia and Lion's peaks.an infrastructure geek
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Heard there are discussions on temporarily closing T4 due to the very weak loads and flights with the current COVID19 situation.
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Originally posted by ycp81 View PostHeard there are discussions on temporarily closing T4 due to the very weak loads and flights with the current COVID19 situation.
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