Accolades for the Hong Kong International Airport (HKIA) continue to pour in. The latest praise comes from a prestigious British magazine whose readers rated HKIA the second best airport in the world.

HKIA scored an overall average satisfaction level of 90.95 percent in the airport category of the 1999 Readers' Travel Awards of Condé Nast Traveller magazine. Hong Kong was just 0.06 percent behind the first-prize winner, Changi Airport of Singapore.

HKIA topped five of the 11 criteria by which airports were judged in the annual awards. These were efficiency of check-in; efficiency of transfer; luggage handling; flight information and clarity of signs; and food and restaurants. The remaining six criteria were location and accessibility; design and layout; cleanliness; pre-flight facilities and lounges; shopping and duty-free facilities; and parking facilities/cost.

Results of the awards came from questionnaires sent to readers. The data was collated and analysed by an independent market research company.

Earlier in the year, the HKIA was awarded the Annual Critics' Choice Award of Travel and Leisure, the foremost US travel magazine.

The magazine said: "Hong Kong has one of the world's premier airports. Luggage moves from plane to carousel in 12 minutes; in 20 minutes you're whisked downtown on a high speed train. Chek Lap Kwok is a streamlined space so attractive, so easy, so filled with natural light, that it just might lead travellers back to the city."

Mr. Richard Purser, the editor of the Canadian Wings magazine visited the airport shortly after the opening. He said: "Chek Lap Kok is a masterpiece of design and engineering; it is everything it is billed to be - the world's engineering achievement of the 90s, as perhaps Europe's Chunnel was the achievement of the 80s."

HKIA currently handles up to 460 flights and 94,000 passengers daily.

For further information please contact Frank Chuan, Chief Information Officer.

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