MEL reportedly best airport in Australia

[Blackadder]

2024 Skytrax World Airports Awards

The highest-ranked Australian airport was Melbourne, which remained unchanged from last year in 19th spot. Brisbane was next highest at 32nd, despite dropping nine places from its 2023 position, followed by Perth at 52nd (up six) and Sydney at 55th (down six).

 

[aikman]

What's the criteria? It wouldn't be for having short arrival immigration queues, short customs queues and easy access by public transport.

 

[Daver6]

Either someone is smoking crack or having the QF dom terminal look like a construction site is considered a good thing.

Who makes this stuff up?!

 

[RooFlyer]

If you go to the full top 100 list, Skytrax, as usual, throws up some 'oddities'.. CDG #6, LHR 21, AMS 23 ... ADL .... 65 .
But DOH I understand

https://www.worldairportawards.com/worlds-top-100-airports-2024/

Been to 60 of them. Hobart not listed amongst them

 

[anat0l]

What's the criteria? It wouldn't be for having short arrival immigration queues, short customs queues and easy access by public transport.

From the article, "The awards are based on customer satisfaction surveys and cover 550 airports worldwide."

Whatever that means. Rumour has it it's basically whoever bribes Skytrax the best.

Skytrax or not, many of the entries aren't too entirely surprising, but I'd be curious to find out what are some of the feedback which put some of those airports in the positions they are in, including, but not limited to, Paris CDG and Melbourne.

Although surely the surveys should or might cover all of the terminals in a certain airport, if there is much international feedback then I suspect Melbourne would be rated nearly solely on T2. I haven't flown out of MEL T2 for ages, but the last time I was there, airside wasn't anything to write home about, except for the usual labyrinthian Duty Free store immediately following outgoing security.

 

[Saab34]

Terminal 4 is like a giant toilet. Disgraceful piece or architecture. Reminds me of Sydney T2.

It really has become of the worst airports in Australia. Don’t even get me started on that damn train.

You visit some airports overseas and you sort of wish ‘if only’ we have something like this back home.

 

[anat0l]

So let's play the opposite of Devil's Advocate.

If you had to try and justify why MEL is Australia's best airport, how would you do it? Serious answers only...

One thing that comes to mind is that International / Domestic transfers are relatively simple at MEL. Unsure if any passenger filling out that survey made a note of that.

 

[clifford]

Terminal 4 is like a giant toilet. Disgraceful piece or architecture. Reminds me of Sydney T2.

Of course, they are both the same animal. Max retail, min decorum.

It pains me to walk through either of them when going to a VA gate.

But join the post Covid flying experience...

 

[RooFlyer]

If you had to try and justify why MEL is Australia's best airport, how would you do it? Serious answers only...

Straightforward DOM <----> transfers. Straightforward DOM <----> DOM transfers on same airline
Straightforward layout. International - in the middle. Qantas ... all over there. Virgin .... over there. The others ... waaaaay over there.
Compact international check-in area
Convenient hotels to DOM and INT
Convenient parking and bus arrivals
Having no train is a big negative but skybus sorta fills the gap to some extent..

I think ADL is Australia's best airport.

SYD, BNE and (I think PER) widely separated dom/international terminal buildings - an instant fail.
Hobart
Darwin was v good when it was new.

 

[clifford]

Darwin was v good when it was new.

How about CBR? Pity about the lack of Intl flights, but it's a lovely experience.

The new OOL isn't too shabby either.

 

[Rich]

What's the criteria? It wouldn't be for having short arrival immigration queues, short customs queues and easy access by public transport.

The Skybus is a form of public transport, like it or not. Not exactly as nice as a train under a terminal building, but it is pretty fast to get between the city and airport so it is not so bad.

If you had to try and justify why MEL is Australia's best airport, how would you do it? Serious answers only...

One thing that comes to mind is that International / Domestic transfers are relatively simple at MEL. Unsure if any passenger filling out that survey made a note of that.

Absolutely on the transfers. My last 2 international arrivals (both connecting to MEL) were in Sydney, which was a disgrace and Cairns which was okay but you had to wander outside to find a poorly sign-posted path to the other terminal.

However, I can't think of much else. I suppose the Uber set up is pretty good. Not much else!

 

[Daver6]

From the article, "The awards are based on customer satisfaction surveys and cover 550 airports worldwide."

Whatever that means. Rumour has it it's basically whoever bribes Skytrax the best.

Explains DOH at the top of the list. It's how they got a soccer world cup there built by slaves.

Skytrax or not, many of the entries aren't too entirely surprising, but I'd be curious to find out what are some of the feedback which put some of those airports in the positions they are in, including, but not limited to, Paris CDG and Melbourne.

Although surely the surveys should or might cover all of the terminals in a certain airport, if there is much international feedback then I suspect Melbourne would be rated nearly solely on T2. I haven't flown out of MEL T2 for ages, but the last time I was there, airside wasn't anything to write home about, except for the usual labyrinthian Duty Free store immediately following outgoing security.

More seriously. We have a bunch of frequent flyers here. Hands up anyone who has ever been surveyed about an airport?

 

[RooFlyer]

How about CBR? Pity about the lack of Intl flights, but it's a lovely experience.

The new OOL isn't too shabby either.

Yes, only been to CBR one in a few years but it was nice. Dunno about hotel/parking etc though. Never been to OOL. Must try it soon.

 

[clifford]

The Skybus is a form of public transport,

I'm sorry, but it's not public transport at all. It's private transport.

Pity the Vic Govt can't (or won't) step up. Too lucrative I imagine.

 

[Austman]

My guess is that:

1. MEL is the second busiest airport in Australia and
2. It's much better than SYD, the busiest.

Those two would be enough for it to win most surveys.

 

[harryhv]

How about CBR? Pity about the lack of Intl flights, but it's a lovely experience.

The new OOL isn't too shabby either.

No, OOL's a pain too. Just landed at Gold Coast airport from SYD and the taxi rank is gone. Seems Uber has bribed the airport to write "Uber" on all of the ten cab-spaces. A convoluted series of signs "Taxis this way" will direct you to a cab-rank in front of another building about 200m away, the "international arrival terminal".

 

[Rich]

I'm sorry, but it's not public transport at all. It's private transport.

Pity the Vic Govt can't (or won't) step up. Too lucrative I imagine.

Definition of public transport from Google:
buses, trains, and other forms of transport that are available to the public, charge set fares, and run on fixed routes.
Most public transport is privately owned or run now. That doesn't make them private transport.

 

[Franky]

No, OOL's a pain too. Just landed at Gold Coast airport from SYD and the taxi rank is gone. Seems Uber has bribed the airport to write "Uber" on all of the ten cab-spaces. A convoluted series of signs "Taxis this way" will direct you to a cab-rank in front of another building about 200m away, the "international arrival terminal".

That’s the same as Sydney domestic - if you want to be picked up by a relative, the area is almost a km away, and your relatives have to pay a fee to get into the area where all the suckers are waiting…. Piss poor….

 

[fly2earth]

Terminal 4 is like a giant toilet. Disgraceful piece or architecture. Reminds me of Sydney T2.

It really has become of the worst airports in Australia. Don’t even get me started on that damn train.

You visit some airports overseas and you sort of wish ‘if only’ we have something like this back home.

So true literally possible to get e coli by going through the security screening (by all the shoes that gets put in the conveyer belt trays)

 

[Human]

Straightforward DOM <----> transfers. Straightforward DOM <----> transfers on same airline
Straightforward layout. International - in the middle. Qantas ... all over there. Virgin .... over there. The others ... waaaaay over there.
Compact international check-in area
Convenient hotels to DOM and INT
Convenient parking and bus arrivals
Having no train is a big negative but skybus sorta fills the gap to some extent..

I think ADL is Australia's best airport.

SYD, BNE and (I think PER) separate dom/international terminals - an instant fail.
Hobart
Darwin was v good when it was new.

I think that's a pretty good assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of MEL. I'd add that the baggage claim is really slow compared with just about every other airport I've been to. And yes, there are buses, but that's nothing like having a dedicated train station or stations. On the other hand, parking is relatively cheap.

I actually think SIN ticks most of the boxes for me, even though having to clear security at the gate is a pain. And much as SYD is a dog's breakfast in so many ways, its proximity to the city, and ease of getting there by train, are big plusses (and its Virgin terminal is better than MEL).