ASTANA – Astana’s International Airport is undergoing a major renovation in preparation for hosting the expected influx of tourists for the upcoming EXPO 2017 international exhibition. Those preparations will include the construction of a new terminal and a new two-level parking lot by 2017, said Chairman of the Astana International Airport Kairat Zhaukhanov during a briefing at the Central Communications Services on March 3.
“If you can imagine the airport’s vicinity, the parking project will be built on two levels,” said Zhauakhanov.
According to the chairman, currently there are two parking lots, one with 250 spots and the other one with 170 spots. Additionally there is a free parking lot outside the airport’s premises. He also noted that the maximum passenger traffic is now 3 million people per year, reached full five years ahead of the plans, and the parking area equals 22,000 square metres. The airport’s new terminal, currently under construction, will increase both, he said.
“I will not reveal any major state secret if I say that, at the time of construction, planners were expecting Astana [International Airport] to reach its maximum annual passenger traffic capacity of 3 million people by 2020, and yet we reached this number by the end of 2014,” Zhaukhanov told the media briefing.
He explained that the airport in Astana is already the second busiest in the country, after Almaty. “The Astana airport services 16 airlines which service 15 domestic and 19 international routes,” he said adding that that means there are around 160 flights processed daily.
“The area of the new passenger terminal will be 45,000 square metres, which is two times more than the current area. We are also planning to increase the passenger traffic to 7.5 million people a year by 2017,” Zhaukhanov said.
The Astana International Airport received $900 million for the makeover of the capital’s major airport, Director General of the Airport Management Group LLP Claude Badan announced on Jan. 29 at a Central Communications Service briefing.
The investment will be made over the next five years, Badan said in January, with many large-scale projects to be implemented between 2015 and 2017. Work is ongoing now on new terminals at the Astana and Kyzylorda airports and other upgrades, including introducing new systems to control queues, are being put into place, Badan told The Astana Times.
