Three decades after it was first conceived in post-reunification Germany, Berlin-Brandenburg Willy Brandt Airport has finally opened to the public. Plagued by corruption scandals, engineering mistakes, and $4 billion in budget overruns, the airport has been a work in progress for 14 years, blowing through six opening dates along the way. The debacle has put a stain on Germany’s sterling reputation of engineering aptitude. “We German engineers are mortified,” says Mr. Lütke Daldrup, a trained engineer and longtime public official who was enlisted to resuscitate the project in 2017. “Germany is known for its engineering competence. We think of ourselves as punctual, efficient, and competent. This was embarrassing for Berlin and for Germany as a whole.”
One effect of the delay: The airport’s design by Hamburg–based GMP Architects, once considered modern, is now a vestige from the ‘90s (Think check-in counters with light walnut paneling and chocolate-colored suede on gate-side seating). Self check-in and cell phone charging stations, which didn’t exist when the airport was first designed, are even being added last-minute. Despite all the challenges, perhaps the airport is quintessentially Berlin, says John C. Kornblum, a former U.S. ambassador to Germany. “This airport is an allegory for Berlin itself. It’s charming, irreverent, eccentric—and utterly dysfunctional.”