As the gateway of the North Eastern trade and financial hub of China, the airport was clean and efficient, from reaching the airport to the immigration and the TSA. Although it is a quite a big airport, we were surprised to find out that it's only a 25-35 minute drive from our hotel in the central (Heping) area of the city which made the journey to and from the airport very easy.
All international, HK, Macau, and Taiwan bound flights depart out of terminal 1, which is the slightly older and dilapidated terminal. However, considering that there are one or two Departures every hour or so, the airport was more than capable of handling all the passengers.
The duty-free shops sold Chinese liquor (for about half or one third the price compared to where I live in Korea) and some souvenirs like silk gowns and teaware, as well as some local snacks. Next to the shops was a medium-sized Starbucks that sold a Tianjin limited edition mug as well as some unique drinks that are only sold in China.
The problem with this airport, though, is their hellish afternoon rush hours. Our flight out of Tianjin was scheduled to take off at 2:40 pm, but ended up being delayed for more than 2 hours due to traffic congestion. Now, I do admit that the airliner (Korean Air) had a bit of a tightly scheduled itinerary. However, when considering that both the Tokyo and Nagoya bound flights on that afternoon were delayed quite significantly, (2-3 hrs) it is clear that the airport has some issues when it comes to keeping up with the passenger demand. (when it comes to both international and domestic flights combined)
To summarise, while Tianjin's Binhai airport is conveniently located and has decent facilities, it does have some room to improve. (Which I believe would be solved when their third wing...
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