Chennai airport revamp set to take off after green signal today

With the Supreme Court upholding the Tamil Nadu government’s decision to acquire land for the expansion...

With the Supreme Court upholding the Tamil Nadu government’s decision to acquire land for the expansion and modernisation of the Chennai airport earlier this month, work on the project is finally on fast track. The Rs 2,700-crore modernisation plan is set to get the clearance of public investment board (PIB) on Tuesday.

“Land acquisition issues that were holding the project back have now been sorted out. The project will be cleared by PIB on July 29 after which it will come up for Cabinet approval,” said a source in the Ministry of Civil Aviation. PIB clearance of the Chennai airport comes even as the Rs 2,000-crore Kolkata airport revamp bid is set to get the Cabinet nod later this week.

Modernisation of the Chennai airport has been delayed by over seven months due to problems in acquiring around 136 acres of land necessary for the first phase of the project. Airports Authority of India (AAI) plans to utilise the acquired land to construct a second runway, parallel to the existing 12,000-feet main runway and extend the 6,500-feet cross runway that has been in operation since December.

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The existence of two parallel runways would enhance the airports handling capacity to 50 flights an hour and allow it to meet the demands of air traffic until at least 2016. The airport can currently handle 28 aircraft movements an hour. While phase 1 now seems to be set for clearance, phase 2 is still contentious since it involves acquisition of over 1,000 acres that would lead to major rehabilitation issues.

Meanwhile, with just eight months left to wrap up unfinished business, the civil aviation ministry is also set to push through the prestigious Rs 1,000 crore satellite-based navigation system project — GAGAN (short for GPS-aided augmented navigation). Expenditure finance committee has recommended the proposal for the consideration of the Cabinet.

The project extends India’s ability to monitor airspace from Africa to Australia. When implemented, it would replace most of the ground-based navigational aids and it would be possible to provide precision approach and landing guidance to aircraft at airports hitherto not available due to terrain conditions. The system is expected to be functional by 2010.

Rs 2,700 cr The total cost of modernising Chennai airport

•AAI plans to use 136 acres to construct a second runway

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• The two parallel runways would enhance the airport’s handling capacity to 50 flights an hour

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