It was opened in 1970[2] and serves as a major air hub for the province of Gansu and western China.

[5] In 1968 construction was started on Lanzhou airport and on July 26, 1970, the maiden flight took place with the first aircraft landing of an Ilyushin Il-14.

[6] In 2010, Lanzhou airport's passenger throughput exceeded 3 million people a year.

[6] Lanzhou Airport Terminal 2 officially started construction in 2010, after preliminary design approval and with an investment budget of 1.488 billion yuan.

At a cost of 31.69 billion Yuan, a new Terminal 3 will be built, two new 4000 meter long runways and facilities will be expanded.

[10][11] The entirety of adjacent namesake Zhongchuan town and several villages, totaling 10.7 square kilometres (4.1 sq mi), were demolished to make way for the expansion, and residents were relocated to Lanzhou and Lanzhou New Area.

[12][13][14] While nominally two terminals, they are connected airside by a lengthy walkway and operate as a single building.

Designed and shaped to resemble the wing of flying geese, at 61,000m2, this terminal greatly increased the operational space at Lanzhou Airport.