Berlin Brandenburg Airport Set to Open October 31, 2020

By Anna Breuer on 4 March 2020
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Departures board at Berlin Tegel Airport

After nine years of delays, Willy Brandt Berlin Brandenburg Airport will open its runways and gates to flyers on October 31, 2020.  The news was announced by Rainer Bretschneider, the head of the airport’s Aufsichtsrat or supervisory board at a business breakfast in Berlin on Tuesday.

Bretschneider said that work still remains but the date of October 31 is locked in.

Named after Willy Brandt, the popular former Reichskanzler of Germany who was in office from 1969 to 1974 after serving as mayor of West Berlin from 1957 to 1966, the airport started to take shape in 2006 when construction of the terminal building began, and it was originally slated to open in 2011.

The airport was originally intended to replace Berlin Schönefeld Airport, which it is also adjacent to, as well as Berlin Tegel Airport, and become the single commercial airport serving both Berlin and the state of Brandenburg. Giving the increase in passenger traffic in the past decade, however, Schönefeld will remain open and part of Schönefeld’s existing infrastructure will be incorporated into BER.

Schönefeld became the Germany Democratic Republic’s most important civilian airport in the 1950s and Interflug, the DDR’s flag carrier, operated out of Schönefeld from 1963 until its demise in 1990, one year before German reunification.

Berlin Brandenburg expects to see annual passenger traffic in the range of 34 million, making it the third largest in Germany after Frankfurt and Munich, and pushing Düsseldorf Airport to the number four slot.  The airport is to replace Tegel although it has been suggested that Tegel be renovated and remain open.

Tenants at the new airport will include Aeroflot, Austrian Airlines, Brussels Airlines, Lufthansa, S7, and Swiss International Air Lines.

(Photo: Accura Media Group)

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