Will Japan's new Ibaraki Airport rise above its critics?

Largely spurned by Japan’s domestic airlines and with only one daily international scheduled flight, Japan’s latest airport to open, Ibaraki, is setting its sights on developing a role as gateway to the Greater Tokyo Area for foreign low-cost carriers (LCCs). With little pre-publicity in the metropolis, what is in realty Tokyo’s third airport opens for business on 11-Mar-2010. The airport was built as an extension to the Hyakuri Japan Air Self Defence Force base. Basically all it needed was a 2,700-metre runway parallel to the military runway, an apron and a passenger terminal.