Implications of the Haneda airport expansion on air passenger transport in Tokyo: A traveller's perspective

The aviation system in Japan has been highly concentrated in the two major airports, Narita and Haneda, in Tokyo because of its political and economic importance. They have been operating at the limit of capacity for years and thus the Haneda airport, originally mainly handling domestic flights only, is recently being expanded to cater for the increasing demand. This paper therefore investigated the strengths and weaknesses of the two airports. The analysis would be conducted from a traveller's perspective with an aim to identify implications for the functional division between them, and thus to promote better co-operations and to avoid any potential mutual competitions. Findings from this study suggested that Narita, being the busiest international airport in Japan, should continue playing its role as an international aviation hub in the Asian region serving travellers transferring between international flights in Tokyo as well as offering better domestic connections for long haul international flights. Conversely, Haneda should be internationalised so as to better utilise the extensive domestic aviation network in providing convenient short and medium haul domestic connections.