Soekarno-Hatta International Airport's New Runway to Be Ready by August
Jakarta. Indonesia's biggest airport, the Soekarno-Hatta International Airport in Tangerang, near Jakarta, is set to open its new third runway next month, completing a year-long project to increase its capacity.
The new runway will allow the airport to cater to 114 takeoffs or landings per hour, up 40 percent from the current 81 movements per hour, Transportation Minister Budi Karya Sumadi said on Sunday.
"Technically the runway is ready for operation," Budi Karya said after observing a test flight on the runway on Sunday.
"The only thing left to do now is to improve coordination with [air navigation authority] AirNav and run through some of the procedures one more time," he said.
Budi said the new runway will be 2,500 meters long when it is opened in mid-August. Another 500 meters will be added by October.
Soekarno-Hatta is Indonesia's busiest airport. More than a quarter of all domestic and international flights came through the airport, which was opened in 1985, last year.
It has been running double or triple its capacity in the past decades. Last year, Soekarno-Hatta catered to 112 million passengers, data from the Central Statistics Agency showed, almost quadruple its original capacity of 33 million passengers.
The runway addition is part of an upgrade to increase the airport's capacity to 51 million people a year by the end of this year.
The other upgrades include revamping its Terminal 1 and Terminal 2, a Rp 3.2 trillion ($229 million) renovation that will double their capacity to 36 million passengers per year.
A fourth terminal is also being built at the airport, which will cost Rp 11 trillion and is set for completion in 2024.
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