KIA sees big jump in passenger, airline traffic in 2017

Bengaluru: The Kempegowda International Airport (KIA) witnessed a big jump in passenger and air traffic movements (ATMs) in 2017. While the airport received 25.04 million passengers, an increase of 12.9 per cent, ATMs grew by 4.3 per cent.

The Bangalore International Airport Limited (BIAL), which operates KIA, announced its annual traffic figures for 2017 (January-December) on Tuesday. 

A BIAL press release stated that in 2016, the airport saw 22.18 million passengers. Meanwhile, 43 scheduled airlines are connected to 62 destinations at national and international level. The airport also witnessed the highest ever passenger movement on December 23 with 87,815 travellers passing through KIA. The same day, it also recorded 603 ATMs – the highest ever for the airport. In 2017, the airport handled 339,461 metric tonnes of cargo.

The On Time Performance (OTP) averaged at 87% and on an average the first bag was delivered to the passenger within 10 minutes of the aircraft reaching the parking bay for both domestic and international arrivals. The average airport taxi waiting time was clocked between 3 and 5 minutes. 

An airport official said that the work on the second runway and design approvals for Terminal 2 (T2) began in 2017 and the construction is scheduled to begin during the middle of 2018. The second runway will be operational by 2019 and T2 by 2021. “US architectural firm Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM) has designed T2, while Turner International will also be part of this project.  T2 will be constructed in two phases. The first phase will cater to 25 million passengers annually (MPA), while the second will add another 20 million passenger capacity.

It is estimated that on completion of both phases of T2, the airport’s overall capacity will reach the 65 million mark,” he said.