Comparisons with Singapore are many in these days of recession and heightened competition.
Most of these are on a fairly esoteric level, but I want to point out the Airport Authority one which is extremely embarrassing to a Hong Konger and yet a cheap one to resolve - attractive, surely, to our cash-strapped authority.
Toilets in Chek Lap Kok smell positively disgusting and yet those in Changi Airport never do. I used both airports on the weekends of June 5 and 6 and June 12 and 13 and the offending toilets were on both landside and airside. Calls to the company responsible (advertised on the toilet walls) were not answered. Why am I not surprised? The solution is hardly difficult or expensive. Do a better job of cleaning the urinals and the floors beneath and clean them more frequently; ensure the auto urinal flushers work and, noticeably, push through enough water and install deodorising units at all urinals.
Inaction on this will merely reinforce the oft-mentioned opinion that we are in a dirty city but we don't care - even in a 12-month-old 'state-of-the-art' airport.
I hope the Airport Authority will reply, through these columns, with details of its proposed actions.
JEREMY NEWTON Happy Valley
