The Hindu Business Line : MIAL re-works Mumbai airport master plan

Mumbai June 17 The GVK consortium-led Mumbai International Airport Ltd (MIAL), which took over operations of the Chattrapati Shivaji International Airport in Mumbai in May last year, has re-worked the original master plan for upgradation of the airport. The major change proposed is to have one integrated terminal at Sahar airport, instead of the original plan to have one terminal at Sahar for international and domestic traffic and another at Santa Cruz for domestic passengers.

A senior official of the company said work on the proposed terminal was likely to begin in the second half of this year. The terminal, which forms part of the $ 1.5-billion master plan prepared by Netherlands Airport Consultants BV, will be rolled out in phases over the next ten years.

Capacity

The fully functional terminal will have the capacity to handle 40 million passengers. The original plan was to set up the Sahar terminal with a capacity to handle 30 million passengers and the Santa Cruz facility with 12 million passengers. "The modernisation process is largely on schedule. The expansion and upgradation process have to go on simultaneously. It has to be understood that Mumbai airport has a space crunch, unlike other upcoming airports," the official said.

The land available for the Mumbai airport is around 2,000 acres, but only 990 acres of this is currently being used for airside operations. Another 276 acres are occupied by slums and the proposed air-side infrastructure development hinges on the rehabilitation of the slums.

MIAL has received the clearance from the Empowered Group of Ministers at the Centre for rehabilitating the slum dwellers. However, the State Government is yet to decide on the cut-off date for eligibility for rehabilitation and complete a survey to determine the number of people to be rehabilitated.

By December 2007, MIAL plans to begin construction of the connector building between Domestic Terminals 1A and 1B, new aerobridges and transit facilities. "There is an AAI facility that needs to be shifted for the connection to be completed. The authority has agreed to shift the facility," the official said.

Already the company has set up new infrastructure facilities such as two new rapid exit taxiways along with a new parallel taxiway that is expected to pare down occupancy time, additional check-in counters at Terminal 1B taking their number to 80 and expansion of the departure section at Terminal 1B. The airport also recently launched high-speed broadband wireless network across all passenger terminals of the airport.

duty-free shops

It has also introduced the concept of duty-free shops, which should be functional by the year-end. For a complete retail experience, the airport has food courts, which include top brands such as Hot Dog, Café Coffee Day, Café Ritazza and also an outlet of Stop & Go from the Shopper's Stop stable.

The airport handled 22.25 million passengers and 4,80,000 tonnes of cargo in the last one year, reflecting a growth of 21 per cent and 11.5 per cent over the previous year respectively.

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