The Hindu Business Line : AAI to spend Rs 30 cr to develop 3 TN airports

The Airports Authority of India (AAI) is spending about Rs 30 crore in developing infrastructure at Madurai, Coimbatore and Tiruchi airports, according to its Regional Executive Director (Southern Region), Dr K. Ramalingam.

For the Madurai airport, the AAI is spending about Rs 11 crore on runway, fire station and a new terminal building to handle international traffic.

For Tiruchi, it is spending Rs 9.1 crore on runway, fire station and a new terminal building, and development work should be completed by June, he told newspersons after releasing a study on `Traffic assessment for Madurai airport' by the Confederation of Indian Industry.

On Coimbatore airport, Dr Ramalingam said the AAI would spend Rs 9.73 crore mainly on increasing the length of the runway. There is also demand for parking space for aircraft.

According to him, April-December 2005 traffic through Chennai airport was 48 lakh passengers, a 15.1 per cent increase over the same period last year.

Traffic through Coimbatore airport increased by 34.4 per cent to 4.15 lakh, Tiruchi had a 12.5 per cent increase in traffic to 1.41 lakh passengers and Madurai had a 9.41 per cent increase to 1.30 lakh passengers.

Madurai and Tiruchi airports are loss making while Coimbatore airport is profit making, he said.

International status

On a report by PricewaterhouseCoopers for CII to give Madurai airport an international airport status, Dr Ramalingam said only the Union Aviation Ministry and the AAI could take a decision after requests come from airlines. Except immigration facilities, infrastructure is available at Madurai airport and if required officials can be diverted from Tiruchi or Thiruvananthapuram.

At Madurai, four flights operate every day and two more are to commence in April. Air Deccan is commencing a Chennai-Tuticorin-Madurai-Chennai service and Paramount Airways is starting a Madurai-Chennai-Bangalore service from April, he said.

Dr Ramalingam said there is a proposal to have an aircraft maintenance workshop in Pondicherry, and this is still in a preliminary stage.

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