YVR Best Airport in North America
byLast night the Skytrax World Airport Awards were announced in a live ceremony in Brussels, Belgium. Although their website hasn’t been updated yet, I found out on Twitter that Vancouver International Airport (YVR) was crowned as the Best Airport in North America (and 11th overall).
The award is based on 9.8 million passenger surveys conducted in airports around the world and measures the results from 39 criteria that include comfort, efficiency, signage, transportation availability, passenger amenities and friendliness.
I had the chance to learn quite a bit about the airport’s art and history when I profiled the YVR Observation Area a few months ago and am glad they received this recognition. The free wifi, free Smarte Cartes, rushing waterfalls, First Nations art, and not having to walk or transfer 35 minutes to your next departure gate are just some of my favourite features. Having traveled through at least a dozen airports this past year, YVR always makes me feel welcome upon my return.
To celebrate, I scoured Creative Commons photos on Flickr to present a small gallery of photos from our beautiful airport.
Please feel free to click on the images or the caption links to view more from the photographers profiled above.
Singapore’s Changi Airport was named the World’s Best Airport by SkyTrax as well as Best Airport Leisure Amenities and Best Airport Asia.
You can follow @YVRAirport on Twitter for announcements, news and travel updates.
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That is awesome news! I’m sooooo proud to have YVR to greet my family, friends & travellers AND WELCOME them to BC with one powerful first impression of Vancouver… Way to go all those who worked on it!
I concur, YVR is definitely North America’s best International/Large airport and definitely should be in the world’s top 20, if not world’s top 10.
I’d agree. When traveling from Asia back to Portland, there are plenty of options to pass through a variety of airports. The two choices you outline are definitely correct in their comfort and ease of getting around.
Now…if only they can resolve the US Customs/TSA gridlock in YVR…it would be the perfect airport.
Having been to a number of airports over the past few years, we have a real gem in YVR. Congratulations to them!
Having done a lot of travel over the past five years (and having just stood in a immigration queue in an awful room at Dallas-Fort Worth for an hour and a half), this is well deserved.
I love the big arrival hall experience that starts on the stairs with the waterfalls on either side. The chlorine smell from the waterfalls tells me that I’m back in North America. 🙂 And then the anxious glance to see how many other arrivals are waiting in the immigration queue. Sometimes several planeloads, sometimes no-one. But always lots of space, fast baggage service and a friendly atmosphere.
I was just looking at the Skytrax site to see when the 2011 awards would be announced. It was a year ago this week that YVR was selected “Best North American Airport”. Can Vancouver International win two years in a row? This year’s awards will be announced in Copenhagen on March 30.