Berlin – The request is unmistakable. “Tear it off and start over, this time employing a globally successful airport planning team, not a psychopathic sadist,” advises David O’Brien angrily. You guessed it: He meant the BER airport. In the international rating portal Skytrax, the passenger who lives in Germany has vented his anger – like other air travelers who have got to know the bad sides of the new capital city airport. There BER gets just three out of ten possible points. One thing is clear: there has been a mess at the airport not only since the beginning of the autumn break.
Aletta von Massenbach, who took over the BER chief position two weeks ago from Engelbert Lütke Daldrup, has certainly expected her start differently. Berlin-Brandenburg Airport, which will be one year old at the end of October, is making negative headlines – once again. Berliners and Brandenburgers who wanted to fly from the new Schönefeld Airport into the autumn vacation experienced chaos. Until they reached (or missed) their planes, they had to spend a lot of time in queues. Lufthansa advised until Tuesday noon to arrive at BER at least four hours before departure. During this time you could also travel by train from Berlin to Frankfurt am Main or Munich. In the meantime, the airline has withdrawn the request, but continues to ask to arrive at BER early – especially for morning departures, as it was said that the number of passengers is particularly high during this time.
There is a shortage of staff, Corona extends clearance
Service providers who handle passengers, baggage and planes lack staff, it said. Which also has to do with the fact that many of the poorly paid employees ran away when short-time work was also prescribed in the corona crisis. BER spokesman Hannes Hönemann announced that the airport company FBB will help out with its own employees in the event of a renewed rush and that Terminal 2 may open as early as Easter 2022. Incidentally, the Corona rules would have made handling more complex and slower, according to the company, which belongs to Berlin, Brandenburg and the federal government. But the 25 passenger ratings at Skytrax show that the problems ran deeper – which could mean that they cannot be resolved or are difficult to resolve.
“I’ve passed the airport five times since June, and each time it’s been a tiring and unpleasant experience,” writes David O’Brien. He does not want to award more than one point out of ten. Robert Steinhoff from Sweden wrestles two points after all. But he too is annoyed with BER: “A shame for Berlin! Learn from Frankfurt or Munich. ”Anoushka McKechnie added:“ I hope that I never have to use this appalling airport again, ”said the British woman. “This is the craziest badly planned airport I’ve ever used,” says her compatriot David Sargeant. When it comes to the ambience, BER appears to him like a “bleak imitation of a Spanish airport from the 1970s”.
dpa / Christoph Soeder
Please wait: queues dominate the picture in Terminal 1.
People waiting dominate the picture, notes David O’Brien. Anoushka McKechnie experienced “a huge queue at check-in, then a huge queue at security, then another huge queue at passport control”. David Sargeant is surprised at the distribution of space in Terminal 1, the central reception building. A lot of space is wasted, while where additional space is needed, for example for waiting passengers, there are only “narrow bottlenecks”, in front of which the passengers crowd. The BER is a “bottleneck nightmare, narrow and completely impractical”, he sums up. In some cases, the passengers would have to wait in hot and unventilated areas, according to O’Brien.
Anyone who has managed to advance further is confronted with people who work at the airport. Here, too, the ratings are mostly bad. Reported are rude, rude employees who don’t speak English, don’t help questions and sometimes give a disorganized impression. “The joyful and warm welcome that was already absent in Tegel and Schönefeld is missing here even more,” writes David O’Brien. “Is that a Berlin or a German affair? As soon as you arrive, you feel like you’ve done something wrong or broken a rule. It’s like in East Germany ”- which probably means the GDR. “The security check is the most inefficient I have ever seen,” summarizes Sandy Schumann, who comes from Great Britain. “Only one person can be processed at a time, so it takes ages.” The employees there are “impolite and aware of their power,” is another assessment.
Not enough seats and toilets that smell bad
There are other obstacles lurking on the way to the gate. “The signs are confusing,” notes passenger Viktor Erich. The German also considers the number of seats to be insufficient. Skytrax has repeatedly criticized the fact that moving walkways, which could save passengers walking on some of the often long distances in the terminal, are defective. Because escalators also did not work or were missing, passengers would also have to struggle up stairs, according to David O’Brien. In BER, the distances are often long, and many passengers are forced to run a “marathon”. “I feel sorry for the elderly and the disabled – anyone who is in a hurry or feels out of shape.” In addition, there are not enough toilets and they are difficult to find. In addition, they “are dirty and smell”.
“After so many years of problems, delays and mismanagement, one would have hoped the new airport would be a triumph of design and modernity,” said O’Brien in his September 18 entry. “Unfortunately, that’s not the case.” The BER is a “terrible airport”. He is not alone in this opinion.
.