The GMR-led Rajiv Gandhi International Airport (RGIA) has announced the commissioning of 26 new parking stands towards the east of passenger terminal building on Wednesday. With the addition of these stands, the airport now has 83 parking stands from the earlier 57, enhancing the aircraft handling capacity by over 45%.
Spread over about 65,000 square meters of the apron area, the parking stands took about 10 months to be completed. It can hold 22 scheduled Code C aircraft and 4 Code B aircraft catering to general aviation or business jets. “The addition of these stands is in line with our overall strategy of maximising the utilisation of our assets to enhance passenger and air-side capacity. This has a direct bearing on the entire aviation value chain,” said G.B.S. Raju, business chairman (airports), GMR Group.
The projected passenger growth of over 20% annually, led by the increasing demand for air travel, spurred the need to start the expansion of the airport. Currently, it handles over 55,000 passengers on a daily basis with over 500 Air Traffic Movements (ATMs) in a day.
The total passenger footfall is approximately 20.90 million from January-December 2018, which is 21% more than that in January-December 2017. It has also handled about 1.75 lakh ATMs from January-December 2018, which is up by 22% from the corresponding duration in the last year, said an official spokesperson. GMR Hyderabad Airports Ltd (GHIAL) CEO S.G.K. Kishore said, “Our efforts have always been to give our passengers best-in-class infrastructure and connectivity through RGIA. With the phenomenal growth in passenger and cargo throughput, as well as aircraft movements, and the resulting fleet expansions, there is a rising demand for aircraft parking stands by airlines”.
