In Memoriam – Budapest Ferihegy Airport Terminal 1

The current Hungarian government can claim credit for a series of mistakes but allowing the national airline to go bust without a successor, when in fact the previous government had left a detailed blueprint for setting up a new airline, is certainly among the most painful. An absolute first is also the fact that Terminal 1 at Ferihegy is now going to be closed since with Malev gone, there is simply not enough traffic to justify keeping the old terminal operational. No other major airport in recent history was forced to close a terminal because they had run out of aircraft…

When Ferihegy was opened on 7 May 1950, the building was one of the most modern and probably the nicest terminals in Europe. The two towers may have appeared a bit superfluous but the real beauty of the building became apparent only from the air… as it befits an airport terminal. The designers had given the building the form of a twin-motor aircraft, an absolute unique feature before or since. Expansion of the passenger handling areas in recent years did hide this noble form to some extent but even to-day, if you look closely on take-off from runway 31L you can still spot the designer’s original intention.

Of course the ideas about passenger flows through an airport were very different then from what they are now. Separating arriving and departing passengers, air-bridges or self-check-in kiosks were not even glimmers in the eyes of the experts and as a result, architecture could still get the upper hand.

The main arrival and departure hall is an impressive place that lends an aura of elegance to the flying experience. Its gleaming marble floor and the original wooden check-in desks were all tributes to what was still seen as the most exotic way to travel.

Two wide stairs led up to the gallery which in turn opened on a terrace that gave a first-hand view of the aircraft parked on the apron as well as the runway itself. “Huge” Li-2s and DC-3s, later IL-14s were there so near, you could almost touch them.

On the lefty side of the gallery a very special, and very expensive, sandwich bar and restaurant served visitors and passengers alike. It had two unique features. First and foremost, it was operated by the famous Honey Bear buffet company whose establishment in downtown Budapest was a major attraction for locals and tourists alike. The second interesting feature was the restaurant part which had its kitchen in the middle and which served both the transit hotel guests and the landside guests at the same time while also separating them. This arrangement would probably never pass to-day’s security requirements but it was sufficient back then…

On the side opposite to the Honey Bear buffet was the VIP lounge. You did not earn access to that place by just flying a lot. A diplomatic passport or party membership card was the only key that opened the doors of the lounge.
One wing of the airport building was indeed a hotel where transit passengers could spend the night, awaiting their connecting flight. “Fast air travel” had a very different meaning in those days.
Departing passengers had to pass through customs control, a strange ritual not found in most other countries but Hungary had strict export control regulations and this was rigorously applied also to air travelers.
Confiscated salami and snaps could be replenished in the tax-free shops which offered mainly Hungarian goods, typically of the folklore type and foodstuffs and drinks, also mainly from Hungary.

The two towers (the motors of the aircraft) were both used right from the start. The one on the right (when facing the building) was occupied by the meteorological observers while the other was home to the aerodrome control unit. Later, when the runway was extended towards the North, this unit moved to the other tower and from then on the met people and the controllers shared the same elevated perch overlooking the field. The tower vacated by ATC was then occupied by the so called Budapest Radio which was not an FM music station but the airline operational control radio facility. In those years state authorities did not allow individual airlines to have their own ops control radios and Budapest Radio was the appointed (and trusted…) provider for this service.

I am sure a lot of people had been wondering over the years what was behind the multitude of French-windows on the face of the building. Well, MALEV Hungarian Airlines had their offices there as well as air traffic control which even had another control unit, approach, also located in the main building. In later years, when the airline and ATC/Airport operations were separated, the building became the exclusive domain of LRI, the Air Traffic and Airport Administration.
When Ferihegy 2 got built, the need for the old terminal diminished rapidly. ATC moved into a new tower and a new control centre and only the offices of the airport operator were still there. At first the place was turned into a kind of general aviation terminal for which it was far too big of course. In the end it were the low fare airlines that saved the day, the old lady got a new lease on life when it was renovated and put to work as Budapest’s low-fare terminal.

Although there had been plans to extend the metro to Ferihegy Airport, this never came to pass and the only public transport reaching to the airport had been the bus, a single line. A few years ago a train station was built on the mainline train track that passes the old airport building. This was of course an anachronistic solution since you could now take a train to the old terminal, but you still had to catch a bus to go to the new terminals a good 15 minutes further away.

As a friend of mine so touchingly said on the Malev Retro Facebook page, what is happening to Terminal 1 now is like the end of a nice marriage. With one partner, MALEV, gone, the other old partner follows within just a few short weeks.
For us, who started our aviation career in or around Terminal 1, its closure will be like losing something precious and irreplaceable. Those old walls hold our youthful dreams, hopes and more…