Ellinikon International Airport - History

History

For the history of the military air base, see Hellenikon Air Base.

The airport was built in 1938, and after the Nazi invasion of Greece in 1941, Kalamaki Airfield was used as a Luftwaffe air base during the occupation. Following the end of World War II, the Greek government allowed the United States to use the airport from 1945 until 1993. Known as Hassani Airport in 1945, it was used by the United States Army Air Forces as early as 1 October 1945, as a base of operations for Air Transport Command flights between Rome, Italy and points in the Middle East. In 1963, the Finnish star architect Eero Saarinen designed the East Terminal building.

With the end of the Cold War, it was agreed to end the USAF presence at the airport and the United States closed its facilities in 1993.

The airport had two terminals; the west terminal for Olympic Airways and the east terminal for international flights. Prior to the closure of passenger traffic the airport was serving 12 million passengers per year. The last aircraft that departed from Ellinikon was an Olympic Airways Boeing 737 bound for Thessaloníki.

The airport is now bounded by residential houses, beaches in the west and in the south by the wooded trees of the Glyfada Golf Club along with the Ellinikon-Glyfada municipal boundary.

After its closure to passenger traffic, the northwest portion of the airport was redeveloped, with runways being converted into a sports park that housed the venues for canoe/kayak slalom, field hockey, baseball, and softball during the 2004 Summer Olympics. Other Olympic-related upgrades to the airport included refitting one of the airport's western hangars to become the main Olympic fencing venues and one of the larger Olympic indoor basketball arenas. Although these massive upgrades changed the northern and western portions of Ellinikon, part of the runway still exists and there is a chance that it will remain in use as a general aviation airport (with a significantly reduced runway). The Athens radar center is still based there. There are three aeroplanes for Olympic Airways in west terminal.

In 2005, the international team led by architects David Serero, Elena Fernandez and landscape architect Philippe Coignet won the international competition to design a metropolitan park on the former site of the Hellenikon Airport, over more than 300 teams of architects.

The competition was sponsored by UIA (International Union of Architects), the Greek Ministry of Environment and the Organization for the Planning and Environmental Protection of Athens (ORSA). The project was further developed in 2006 and 2007 by this team trough two development phases with the planning organizations of Athens.

Serero’s team developed a strategy to landscape and urbanize the 530 hectares of the Hellenikon site by using natural running water patterns on the site as a concept to design the largest sustainable park in Europe. The water used by the park is effectively originating up to 80% of water collected naturally on the site. The project is structured by seven North-South green valleys that are called “Softscapes”. The “Softscapes” are irrigated corridors that channel and collect rainwater of the site and from the water catchment basin of the surrounding hills. These strips integrate a playful work on artificial topography that both guides the water and create terraces and slopes for the park activities and programmes.Today, the main terminal is used for exhibitions and concerts. On April 2011 was born the new Olympic Airways Museum in the old terminal west of O.A.

Since its termination in 2001 the airport is out of use.