TOKYO -- Hosting tens of thousands of visitors per day, international airports offer a unique setting for retail and entertainment. Asian airports are eager to take advantage as an expanding middle class and the growth of budget carriers add fuel to fire, with the facilities morphing from mere waystations to shopping and leisure destinations in their own right.
In Singapore, Changi Airport's new Jewel commercial complex is a 1.7 billion Singapore dollar ($1.24 billion), 135,700-sq.-meter facility that offers much more than a typical duty-free area. It features, among other things, the world's tallest indoor waterfall and the country's largest maze.
