26.6.08

Mysore Airport to be ready soon

Mysore's Mandakalli airport is almost set for operating ATR charter flights in about two months' time and will be ready for regular ATR flights by February 2009, by when the Rs 70 crore first phase works will have been completed, a delay by two months.The runway is more or less completed. Along with it, facilities for taxying, six-km length peripheral road, security wall, office premises and other facilities were in place before March alone, instead of scheduled April. Chartered flights can be allowed once some openings in the security wall are closed, by providing an alternative route to the Mandakalli village.Delay in acquiring about three acres of land required for creating an alternative route to the villagers, is holding up the pluggings in the security wall. The Karnataka Industrial Area Development Board was directed at the meeting to take up the acquisition work without further delay. The airport would become operational before Dasara for charter flights. For regular flights, however, the airport will be ready only by February 2009. This is because the work on the control tower, which is now in progress, has been raised from four to seven floors for Boeing operations after the phase II works, for which land acquisition for runway extension from 1.74 km to 2.4 km is in progress. Sanction has been already given for the Rs 140 crore civil and electrical works of the second phase. The Karnataka government is providing the land for the entire project, while the AAI is creating the airport infrastructure, he said.311 acres are needed for the second phase of which 268 acres are in different stages of acquisition. The remaining 50 acres will be made available to AAI depending upon its requirement. The first phase covers 524 acres.The Mysore-Ooty national highway will be shifted 2.5 kms to the east of the present location for facilitating second phase expansion, which will become part of the six-lane highway to the hill station.

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