New Larnaca airport should reflect our ancient heritage

Sir,

As Larnaca airport stumbles from one embarrassing revelation of its inefficiency to another, some may look forward to the opening of the new Larnaca airport terminal building as a fresh beginning and the turning of a page in a sorry saga. I wonder, though…

I drive regularly into Larnaca and watch with some dismay the development of the new Larnaca Airport terminal building as it rears its ugly façade above the skyline. This monstrous slab of concrete might easily be mistaken for a penitentiary so unrelieved and grim is its outline.

Most would agree that international airports are generally unlovely buildings, not noted for any elegant contribution to the 21st century: Bangkok looks more like a stainless steel version of Waterloo station, and as for Heathrow – which has grown over the decades into a rambling confusion of conflicting styles ranging from sixties brick to nineties glass and concrete – the less said the better.

But there are exceptions: Malta has made a genuine attempt to create an airport building reflecting some of the traditions of Maltese architecture. How sad therefore that Cyprus has passed-up this golden opportunity to do likewise. Cyprus possesses a unique architectural heritage: its building in stone regularly delights visitors who have been tempted away from the horrors of the tourist areas to explore inland villages.

Is it beyond the wit of today’s architects to incorporate into a modern building some of the styles that have stood the test of time; or are their egos too precious to acknowledge that a previous generation of untutored builders knew better how to please the eye?

The noted travel writer Colin Thuberon once described the suburbs of Limassol as “this bungaloid wasteland of pastel-painted concrete”.

How might a future travel writer be tempted to describe his first sight of Cyprus as he arrives at the new Larnaca Airport I wonder?

Michael Duddridge,
Maroni

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.