Privatizing NAIA

Third time’s the charm, or so they say, but will this hold true in the privatization of the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA)? Past attempts have failed; never mind that these attempts came from the country’s most powerful taipans.

What makes the Marcos administration confident it will work this time? Perhaps, because the times call for it – now more than ever; perhaps it’s because the government really does not have enough resources to create a world-class gateway.

At a recent dinner, Transportation Secretary Jaime “JJB” Bautista, together with Manila International Airport Authority (MIAA) general manager Cesar Chiong, said one of the long-term solutions for an improved main gateway is to try – yet again – to privatize the operations and maintenance of NAIA.

Investor friendly

Thus, Sec. JJB said the government is already working on improving the implementing rules and regulations (IRR) for public-private partnerships to make it “investor friendly.”

For one, there will be a “facility for mediation” in case of a dispute between the government and investors, taking the cue from privatization practices of other countries.

The next step is to formulate a new TOR – terms of reference – for the proposal, detailing what improvements the government wants to see in the airport.

The target is to have the TOR ready in the first quarter and make it available to interested proponents so they can prepare their respective proposals.

A world-class gateway

Sec. JJB said the idea is to have a modern gateway that will be at par with the best in the world; terminals would be connected and there would be significant engineering solutions to ease runway congestion.

From my own experience traveling abroad and passing through different gateways, here’s what I hope to see in a new and modern NAIA:

1) Seamless connections.

At the Hamad International Airport in Doha for instance, some connecting flights are timed in such a way that passengers need to go straight from one flight to the next. This is possible in Doha because the flights are on time and connections are arranged in a way that the gates for the connecting flights are near each other.

2) Automated baggage drop-off.

At the Copenhagen Airport Kastrup in Denmark, I tried for the first time checking in my luggage using a fully automated baggage drop-off.

The first step is that you print your boarding pass from a nearby check-in machine. You then scan this at the baggage drop-off, which would then print out a baggage sticker for the bags. You then put the baggage with the sticker on the baggage ramp and you’re done. You can do all these without dealing with any airline or airport personnel. These systems are easy to use, intuitive and efficient.

Wouldn’t it be nice if we have something like this, too?

3) Self-service kiosks.

Indeed, there’s also a lot of room for automation at NAIA as what’s been done at the multi-awarded Mactan Cebu International Airport such as automated scanning for boarding pass, automated tray retrieval, inline baggage screening; contactless self-service check-in kiosks.

4) Transportation booths.

We can also learn a thing or two from an international airport as small as Iceland’s Keflavík International Airport, which has an easy-to-spot and very helpful transportation desk for arriving passengers. It’s not like a whole market place of transportation service providers. There’s just one booth that directs you to different transportation options.

5) Tram or bus.

At the Kansai International Airport, there’s a tram that moves passengers between terminals, plus automated customs and immigration checking counters.

There is indeed so much to learn from other gateways from the world over.

As some business observer said, “Pwede naman tayong manggaya (We can copy best practices).”

The good news is that MIAA general manager Cesar Chiong said they already have a long list of plans for improvement. They already removed the X-ray machines at the entrance of the departure areas – which is a practice in other airports abroad – to give more room for departing passengers.

There are also plans to use biometrics/facial recognition for faster security checks, etc.

Terminal 2 will also eventually be realigned as a solely domestic airport as it was designed for, says GM Chiong, for more operational efficiency.

Quiet airport

But my favorite plan is to put NAIA in the growing list of silent airports in the world. Ah, wouldn’t that be bliss? This means doing away with those annoying airline announcements – which we hear every five minutes.

GM Chiong said flight details are posted anyway on the information boards while the boarding times are indicated on the boarding passes. Final call announcements and paging of late passengers are thus no longer necessary.

Announcements may be limited to emergencies, lost or found children and flight delays.

I am very much looking forward to this. It seems mundane or even impractical to go after these announcements but they actually make so much sense.

It’s difficult to comprehend announcements in an airport setting anyway, because they’re sometimes muffled, just like those annoying reminders from our barangay’s cheap sound system – nothing but aural bombardment.

Whether or not NAIA will be in the hands of the private sector, I really just fervently hope the main airport and all our other gateways finally become world class. It’s not going to be a walk in the park for sure because positive and lasting changes require shaking the status quo and when that happens, the existing players in the system tend to fight back.

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Email: [email protected]. Follow her on Twitter @eyesgonzales. Column archives at EyesWideOpen on FB.