The executive board of Airports of Thailand (AoT) has approved a 163 billion baht budget for the expansion of Suvarnabhumi airport, the chairman, Teerapol Noprampa, said on Friday.
The meeting agreed with the “single airport” concept favoured by the International Civil Aviation Organisation. It had approved a plan to expand Suvarnabhumi airport to enable it to handle 103 million people a year by 2024, he said.
Mr Teerapol said the expansion plan is in three phases.
The first stage, from 2013-2016, covers construction of a domestic passenger terminal, a third runway, carpark building for domestic passengers and and internal linking road system. The projected cost is 21.8 billion baht.
The second phase, from 2017-2020, is costed at 43.4 billion baht and includes expansion of both domestic and foreign passenger terminals and the construction of a fourth runway.
The third phase, from 2020-2024, with a total budget of 98.3 billion baht, is for the construction of a fifth runway, additional passenger terminals and the expansion of car parking space.
Mr Teerapol said the AoT plans to move its remaining services for domestic passengers at Don Mueang airport to Suvarnabhumi airport in 2016.
Don Mueang airport director Wing Commander Pratheep Wichittho said from Aug 1, all services for domestic passengers at the airport will be moved from the current domestic passenger terminal to terminal No1, the international terminal.
He said the domestic passenger terminal will be renovated under a plan to redevelop Don Mueang airport as an aircraft maintenance and repair centre.
Mr Pratheep said the No1 passenger terminal can handle up to 16 million arrivals annually.
He expected number of passengers using Don Mueang airport to reach 3.95 million this year, up 44 per cent from last year.
Source: http://www.bangkokpost.com/breakingnews/249389/b163bn-for-suvarnabhumi-airport-expansion
