Bial terminal for budget carriers

Bial terminal for budget carriers
URVASHI JHA
Bangalore
Deccan Chronicle





BANGALORE International Airport Ltd (BIAL) the operator of a new international airport in Devanahalli plans to build a terminal for passengers flying low cost airlines to ease the expected congestion in the existing terminal building. The existing terminal has been designed to handle only 11 million passengers in its first year of operation. Passenger traffic estimates have been revised three times, more than doubling from five million to 12 million over last three years.

"It is one of the most promising solutions, because it can be realized fast and take a portion of passengers," said Albert Brunner, chief executive of BIAL. "There will be space for passengers of full service airlines".

BIL board would consider a proposal in July for the simple low cost terminal in addition to a second terminal and a runway, he said, but did not elaborate. "It is for more capacity for (low cost) passengers, one (that is a simple) structure and can be done fast," Brunner said. The low cost terminal is expected to be ready by December 2009 or early 2010.

Bial expects to invest over Rs 2,500 crore in its second phase of expansion, including an additional runway to accommodate passenger traffic that is expected to grow to 18 million in three years. The second parallel runway is expected to become operational only by 2011.

BIAL is a consortium of German infrastructure company Siemens Projects Ventures; L&T, and Unique Zurich Airport, which operates the international airport in Zurich, Switzerland. The Airports Authority of India and the Karnataka government hold 13% equity in the project, built at a cost of Rs2,530 crore. The consortium had earlier estimated the project to cost Rs1,420 crore, when it began work in 2005.