Work in progress at Milan Linate airport, Sala Leonardo lounge doubles in size and could become beautiful
New lounge at Milan Linate, work in progress at city airport
LIN
Milan airports marked a banner 2023, traffic increased by 22% over the previous year, but most importantly. passengers who have returned to pre-pandemic levels, very interesting data considering that 2023 was still difficult for passengers from the east, with many fewer flights and passengers in the Milan area than in 2018.
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There is one aspect, however, the one in the lounges, where the two SEA-operated airports fall short of the rest of the major hub airports in Europe and beyond. A Linate However, things are set to change within a few months.
Work in progress at Milan Linate airport.
Impossible not to notice the work in progress on the second floor of the Linate plaza. Here pre-pandemic were the Alitalia House, which has now become the ITA Airways lounge, the Leonardo Hall and the Michelangelo restaurant. The latter was never reopened, and today major renovations are underway on those premises.
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The area affected by the work borders the current ITA lounge and extends to the corridor where the elevator and entrance to the Leonardo room is.
TFC tried to ask SEA, the company that manages the Milan airport, for confirmation, but we received nothing but a "No comment." The clues, however, are clear, the sign posted on the construction site says that the work concerns the Leonardo VIP Lounge and not the Michelangelo restaurant, so it is obvious to think that this is a renovation of the interior and then to merge these spaces with those of the current lounge.
At the moment there is not even a hypothetical completion date, but given the type of operations to be carried out, my guess is that they could be finished in time for peak summer traffic.
Linate's new lounge will (potentially) be one of the best in Europe
At Leonardo Hall today suffers from chronic underdiming. It is the only independent lounge at the airport to allow access to priority pass holders and to serve all premium passengers of airlines that do not have access to the other two lounges at the airport i.e. ITA Airways lounges and those British and Iberia companies that have the lounge on the ground floor of the terminal).
The 'other shortcoming has always been the lack of runway view and natural light. Problems set to disappear once the expansion is completed, with more than double the area and a spatial view of the Linate runway, quite similar to that of ITA's lounge, indeed potentially better.
From this new section you will be able to admire the movements on the (few) fingers and the bustle of buses, but also on the Linate hangar and its iconic advertisement.
With this expansion the new lounge could compete with what we at TFC believe are some of the best independent lounges around Europe as the Pau Casals of Barcelona, the Rix Lounge in Riga.
This latest addition completes the redesign of Milan's city airport, After the complete renovation of almost the entire air terminal, work that brought Linate at the top in its category worldwide, above all, however, it will improve the lives of a good portion of the nearly 10 million passengers who board a flight from this airport each year.
