Hellenikon Air Base Cyprus (1975), Ethiopia (1977), and Iran (1979, 1981). The American base was renamed Hellenikon Air Base on 25 February 1976, and also provided administrative and logistical support to U.S. units and organizations in Greece, the Middle East, Eastern Mediterranean, and parts of Africa. 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. In 1963, the Finnish star architect Eero Saarinen designed the East Terminal building. Prior to closing its passenger service, the airport was serving 12 million passengers per year. Hellenikon Air
Hellenikon Metropolitan Park forward and a preliminary agreement has been signed to sell some of the land to Qatari investors for development. The site of the future Hellenikon Metropolitan Park is the former Athens International Airport at Hellenikon. 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