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V. Rishi Kumar

Hyderabad , March 8

AFTER years of wait, civil works of the Greenfield Hyderabad International Airport project, with several unique features such as `Airport Village,' and featuring airline hubs, would get under way formally with the foundation stone laying by the AICC President, Ms Sonia Gandhi, later this month.

A GMR Group spokesperson told Business Line, "Though the work on the project had begun with the construction of a boundary wall spanning 24.5 km around the 5,000 acres of land dotting various service roads, the foundation stone would actually help speed up the work on the project."

The GMR Group headed consortium, including Malaysia Airports Holdings Berhad, had late last year signed up with the Centre for a concessionaire for this Rs 1,400-crore project set to come up in Shamshabad about 35 km from here.

With the financial closure, and the civil works underway, the Hyderabad airport will feature one of the longest runways of 4,260 metres and handle the Airbus 380 and other large bodied aircraft.

By 2008, the phase one of the project would be ready hosting capacity to handle about 3.7 million passengers per annum. This is expected to go up to about five million by 2012, seven million by 2017 and nine million by 2021.

When completed, which is planned for 2020, it will have two runways. The airport will also have cargo-handling capacity of 100,000 tonnes.

The Hyderabad airport will host what is being described as an Airport Village that will boast of shopping malls both for travellers and for people based in the city, which is being referred to as unique to such an airport project. The terminal building is designed to be sound proof.

This will be complemented by a passenger boarding bridge designed to provide easy access to physically challenged persons.

While private airliner Sahara has announced plans to locate their operational hub in Hyderabad, Jet Airways too is considering locating a hub in Hyderabad.

The State Government, on its part, is working on building a multi-lane highway connecting the airport for faster transport, and is also teaming up with the Indian Railways to consider expanding the metro rail network to the airport.

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