NEW DELHI/GREATER NOIDA: Zurich Airport International has selected a consortium of Nordic, Grimshaw, Haptic and STUP as architects to design the passenger terminal of the new greenfield international airport that it will build in Greater Noida’s Jewar.
The Delhi Noida International Airport (DNIA), NCR’s second after Delhi’s IGI, is chasing an April 2023 launch date for commercial flight operations. Zurich AG, which has been chosen as the concessionaire for the project, is expected to get the land, which has been acquired, after the resettlement of people with houses at the site. The process is likely to be completed by mid-2021, said officials of the Yamuna Expressway Industrial Development Authority (YEIDA), which is piloting the project.
The consortium was selected through a design competition held in three phases in June, July and August this year. The winning entry has taken inspiration from the designs of Hyderabad, Oslo, Istanbul and Zurich airport, officials said.
They will combine “the collective experience and knowledge from the airports in Hyderabad, Oslo, Istanbul, Zurich to create a truly modern, innovative and green airport, based in a region of strong historic and cultural tradition”, DNIA said in a statement.
The design previews of the terminal building at Jewar were made available on Thursday. Arun Vir Singh, CEO of Noida International Airport Limited, the government’s special purpose vehicle for the airport project, told TOI, “These are the first visuals of the terminal building design prepared by the concessionaire. We are going through the terminal design report to understand the concepts Zurich AG wants to introduce through the Jewar airport.” Because of the pandemic, the architects prepared and presented their designs remotely.
Participants had a simple brief – merge Swiss efficiency and Indian hospitality. “The winning design, presented by Nordic, Grimshaw, Haptic and STUP, best fits the defined project objectives: merging Swiss efficiency and Indian hospitality, creating a modern and seamless passenger experience, setting new benchmarks in sustainability for airport terminal buildings in India, envisioning green spaces inside and around the building, offering a concept for a future airport city, and providing flexible expansion options to serve 3 crore passengers per year in the future,” the DNIA statement added.
Christoph Schnellmann, the CEO of Yamuna International Airport Private Ltd, a 100% subsidiary of Zurich AG that has been incorporated as a special purpose vehicle for the project, said, “We are pleased to partner with Nordic, Grimshaw, Haptic and STUP to design this long-envisioned strategic project at Jewar. The team created the winning design with an efficient layout, convincing design language, multiple high-quality areas, spaced out with lush greenery, with a balanced concept for both energy savings and a tangible sense of sustainability... We will work closely with the team to ensure a design with everything available that a passenger expects at a world-class airport.”
Speaking on behalf of the winning consortium, Gudmund Stokke, founding partner and head of design at Nordic, said: “We are very happy to have won the confidence of Zurich Airport through our competition design for the new Delhi Noida International Airport. DNIA will become a unique new gateway to the world city of Delhi and to the state of Uttar Pradesh.”