New look for Chennai airport

Chennai/New Delhi: The Chennai airport is bustling with activity. Not because there is a sudden spurt in air traffic, but because of the feverish pace at which the expansion project is going on. More than a 1,000 workers, mostly from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, are employed on the site
When you pass by on the Grand Southern Trunk Road, or National Highway 45, along which the airport is situated, you can see the steel framework for the terminal buildings in place. At the far end, a good 10 km away by road, work on the runway over the Adyar river is in progress. This runway, the officials associated with the project construction tell us, will be able to handle even Airbus A-380 aircraft that are the biggest civilian planes to be built so far. They assure us that even if the Adyar were to get flooded and the water level rises, it will still not submerge the runway.
There are three separate improvement projects underway at the airport. The first is the expansion of the runway and apron capacity. The secondary runway, now 6,840 feet long, will be extended by 1.03 km, including the bridge over the Adyar and the parallel taxi track. The handling capacity will go up to 40 aircraft movements an hour from 30 now, besides there will be 14 aircraft additional parking bays.
The international terminal building is being expanded by 59,300 sq m to cater to an additional four million passengers a year. A new domestic terminal building is being built with an area of 67,700 sq m to handle 10 million passengers a year. All this will cost the Airports Authority of India (AAI) Rs 2,015 crore, against the originally estimated Rs 1,808 crore. There have also been some changes in the project with the AAI deciding against a multi-level car park. Instead, this will be a separate project in public-private partnership for 1,200 cars spread over three basement levels.
03/01/11 Business Line

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Categories: Airports Jan 2011