JOIN USBIA expansion set to take off
Highly placed sources said the foundation stone for the expansion is expected to be laid by Union Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel and Chief Minister B S Yeddyurappa in the first week of June.
“The facade of the BIA will witness a sea change to create a ‘Wow’ effect when completed. It is expected to be a super iconic structure. Apart from the expansion of terminal 1 that would be modified to reflect the local culture and flavour, the expansion would also envisage construction of a new terminal 2 and have it connected to terminal 1, at the later stage of construction,” said sources.
Once complete, terminal 1 and 2 at BIA will have the capacity to handle 40 million passengers per annum. In April, BIAL had announced approval of expansion of the existing terminal and stated that when completed, terminal 1 alone will be expanded by 70 percent of the existing building with an additional passenger space of 40,000 square meters. This addition, would then take the terminal 1 capacity to 17 million passengers per annum, a requirement that will suffice till the year 2015 and beyond.
Currently, the BIAL is in the process of finalising the construction partners for this project through competitive bidding. The cost of this expansion is estimated to cost around Rs 600 crore. In addition to this, a completely new landscaping concept will also take shape right from the Trumpet Interchange on NH7, leading all the way to the terminal building.
The new greenfield airport that opened to commercial operation on May 24, 2008 has recorded passenger traffic growth of 14 percent over the last financial year (2008 -09) and would see this trend continue this year, as well.
Currently, the BIA handles approximately 310-315 air traffic movements (ATM’s) a day, with domestic operation constituting 87 percent and international 13 percent in-terms of ATM’s.