Airport’s City Terminal

საქალაქო აეროსადგური

Architects Davit Morbedadze, Tamaz Tevzadze, Teimuraz Kandelaki – „TbilQalaqProekti“

Design 1983-1984

Status unrealized

Function Airport’s city terminal

Location Akaki Tsereteli Avenue 142, Tbilisi
Google maps

Massive, round in a plan inner-city airport terminal was designed by the architects Davit Morbedadze, Tamaz Tevzadze and Teimuraz Kandelaki. The project should be located near the important traffic junction of Tbilisi – the metro and railroad station “Didube”. The main function of the station was to serve passengers, check them in and transport them to the airport 35 kilometers away. The terminal’s capacity was 1100 passengers per hour. The project also included the central airline administration office,  ticket offices, a hotel and a restaurant.

Work on the project began in 1983 in the “Tbilqalaqproekti” and lasted about a year. The drawings of Tamaz Tevzadze show that in the center of the building there is a large, round multifunctional space. The lower part of the volume is enclosed by a series of powerful pylons. This three-story, semi open space was primarily intended to serve passenger and transportation circulation, as well as general storage facilities. The upper volume of the building has the shape of a ring. Here, on two floors, are located the hotel rooms on both sides of the corridor.

As the architect Kiazo Nakhutsrishvili states, “the authors managed to find a planning solution for the structure of a comprehensive project, which ensures the satisfaction of complex technological needs and at the same time presents itself with an interesting volumetric-spatial and architecturally original, memorable form. In the architectural-compositional solution, the authors considered it appropriate to insert a compact, unified and compositionally non-oriented volume that would play the main role in the organization of the surrounding space, in order to organize the existing chaotic environment and disordered space.“

The so-called city airport stations were built in the capitals of several Soviet republics, including Moscow and Almaty. The project in Tbilisi was not realized. In an article published in 1998 in the newsletter “Sakartvelos Respublika”, Tamaz Tevzadze states that the implementation of the project was prevented only by the lack of funds. (mg)

Photos: Davit Morbedadze personal Archive, Tamaz Tevzade personal Archive

Literature/Links

Nakhutsrishvili, Kiazo: Teimuraz Kandelaki. Tbilisi 2003 (geo).
Newsletter “Sakartvelos Respublika”, Tbiliseli, 28.04.1998 (geo).