Airport capacity could go up to 40 million
Chennai, Jan. 30:
The Emirates Group has shown interest in making Chennai airport as its
hub.
“We are looking at this and are open to any airline for such an
arrangement,” said V.P. Agrawal, Chairman, Airports Authority of India. In
fact, the Emirates group is one of the biggest airlines in the Chennai airport
for both passenger and cargo segments.
“With the newly built terminals and better sea connectivity, Chennai
airport could become a hub mainly to connect the South-East Asian countries,”
he told newspersons.
Airports in Hyderabad and Bangalore do not have the advantages that
Chennai has, he said.
According to Agrawal, the Chennai airport’s capacity can go up to 40
million from the present 23 million, which will be enough till 2017-18.
In fact, the Centre for Aviation had given its recommendation to
increase the capacity to 40 million. “We are looking at this and will take
action soon,” he said.
On the user development fee at Chennai airport, Agrawal said that there
would be a marginal increase but it will be lower than some of the private
terminals.
The capacity of the airports in India is expected to reach 271.24
million passengers by the end of the 12th Plan, which will be adequate to
handle the project demand of 268.44 million passengers up to 2016-17, says a
press release.
At present five major airports are being operationaised under the
private-public-partnership at New Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Hyderabad and
Kochi. The new terminal building is under construction at Mumbai airport and
phase I for international operations is likely to be ready by August, while the
second phase for domestic operations will be ready by August 2014.
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