India: Mumbai starts work on new airport, two decades after proposing it

Mumbai finally started work on a new airport more than two decades after first proposing it, as jets ran out of space to operate in one of the busiest aerodromes using a single runway. On Sunday, PM Narendra Modi laid the foundation stone of Navi Mumbai International Airport, to be built on about 1,160 hectares of land about 35 km southeast of the existing facility. The new airport, expected to handle 60m passengers annually when fully complete, is running behind schedule with problems ranging from approvals to delays in the bidding process. “We are trailing behind in infrastructure given the pace at which the aviation sector is growing,” Modi said. “We are trying to press ahead with the speed of execution.” India has been lagging behind China, Singapore and Dubai among regional hubs in upgrading airports. In 2019, Beijing is due to open a $12.9b facility that will become the city’s second mega airport and capable of accommodating more than 75m passengers with as many as seven runways. In the past two decades, Singapore and Dubai have boosted their capacity, building new terminals and becoming the eastern and western hubs for Indian air travellers. “There are no more slots in Mumbai,” said Sanjiv Kapoor, COO at Vistara, the Indian affiliate of Singapore Airlines. “All the airlines have a hit a wall. It is not good when the commercial capital is not able to add flights. We certainly want to fly more to Mumbai”. The first phase with one runway will be operational by December 2019, handling 10m passengers a year, according to local officials. The airport, first proposed in 1997 and approved a decade later by India’s cabinet, will be built by a joint venture between a GVK Power & Infrastructure Ltd.-led consortium and state-run former monopoly Airports Authority of India. GVK also operates the current Mumbai airport, which has the capacity to handle 40m passengers annually.<br/>