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NEWS & EVENTS |
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NEWS AND EVENTS |
Business
Line - Chennai airport to have courier terminal soon
Our Bureau Chennai , June 22 Chennai airport will soon have an exclusive
courier terminal, which will cater to needs of the courier industry. Talking to
newspersons at the Bhoomi puja of the new terminal, Mr Dinesh Kumar, Chennai Airport
Director, said the building would cost about Rs 4 crore. This would be a double
storied building with floor plates measuring about 1,242 sq m each. The terminal
will have X Ray scanner, fire alarm system, CCTV and truck call system. The building
would be completed by February 2007, he said. Second terminal He said that a second
courier terminal was also in the pipeline and work on that one would start once
this facility was commissioned. He said that Chennai airport handled between 300
and 400 packages every day. This terminal would help courier companies reduce cost
as the security requirement of an on-board courier would not be there, he said.
Talking about the passenger amenities at the domestic airport in Chennai, he said
the new departure area for low-cost carriers would be ready in six weeks.
The Hindu - Separate terminal for courier services at Chennai
airport
P. Oppili
— Photo: A. Muralitharan
New building: The new courier terminal at the Chennai old airport.
CHENNAI: A new separate terminal for handling import and export couriers started
functioning at the old airport from Wednesday.
Hitherto, the courier loads used to land at the international departure area and
the clearing of loads used to be done at the international arrival, said Airports
Authority of India officials.
The new facility had been created in 900 sq m with ground floor measuring 500 sq.
m and the first floor measuring 400 sq. m. The Customs and Airports Authority of
India would supervise the operations and the custodianship of the new terminal had
been entrusted to a private organisation, said the officials.
Increase in parcels
Records with the Customs authorities showed that there has been a considerable increase
in the number of courier parcels cleared at the Chennai airport in the last three
years. During 2004-05, the authorities cleared more than 58,000 parcels, in the
next year it touched over 70,000 and in the last fiscal they cleared a total of
1.49 lakh parcels, said C. Rajan,
Commissioner of Customs, Airport. The increase in the number of parcels had earned
good revenue in the form of Customs Duty. For example during 2004-05, the Customs
department earned Rs. 7 crore, the next year Rs. 8 crore and in the last fiscal
it earned Rs. 15 crore, said Mr. Rajan.
The new terminal to a large extent helped in decongesting both the international
arrival and departure areas, said the authorities.
Under the old system, whenever the couriers were sent through the departure hall
of the passenger terminal, it had to be accompanied by a person called as ‘On Board
Courier.’ Under the new system, that could be avoided, said the officials.
Various facilities at the new terminal included X’ ray baggage inspection system,
conveyor system, electronic weighing scale with computer interface, baggage trolleys
hydraulic tow, surveillance systems - CCTV camera recording with backup, said S.
Sakthivadivel, Managing Director, Esquire Express
India private limited, the Custodian
of the terminal.
The Hindu - Airport to be expanded
By T.S. Shankar CHENNAI, MARCH 10 .
The Airports Authority of India (AAI) has chalked out expansion plans for the Chennai
airport, taking into account a projected 9.6 per cent growth next year.
The AAI Chairman, K. Ramalingam, told The Hindu that the not-in-use departure area
of the Anna international terminal (AIT) would be converted into a new arrival module.
Will ease congestion
This would help to create an additional 10, 000-sqmt concourse area and ease congestion,
especially during bunching of flights.
The Rs. 22.48-crore modification project would be completed within 12 months.
Mr. Ramalingam and R.J. Treasuryvala, airport director, said that during 2003-04,
the AIT handled 2.05 lakh passengers and the Kamaraj domestic terminal (KDT) 5.05
lakh passengers, with 16 international airlines and five domestic carriers operating
out of this southern gateway.
The AIT recorded a 5.4 per cent growth this year over the last year and the KDT
13 per cent increase.
From May 11 Delta Airlines would operate a direct daily service from the AIT to
the via Paris. The Austrian Airlines also expressed a keen interest to link services
to Chennai. Its authorities would hold discussions with the airport director next
week. In the domestic sector, three more private airlines — Kingfisher, Royal Airlines
and Go — are planning operations from Chennai. The existing major players are Jet
Airways and Air Sahara.
Eighteen new parking bays would shortly be added, 10 of them in the next 15 months
at a cost of Rs.15 crores. At present there are 31. The increase would facilitate
quick turnaround of widebodied jets and ease congestion.
Projects in the pipeline
Other projects to be completed within the next 10-18 months include construction
of an exclusive ground support equipment hardstand (Rs. 4.95 crores), a line maintenance
building (Rs. 3.49 crores), a shoulder and turn-pad for secondary runway (Rs. 8.50
crores), link taxi tracks for private operators (Rs.15.55 crores), a new courier
terminal adjacent to the Meenambakkam airport complex (Rs. 8.44 crores) and phase-II
integrated cargo complex (Rs. 27 crores).
In principle approval
In a press release, the office of the Communications Minister, Dayanidhi Maran,
tonight said the Prime Minister accorded "in principle" approval to the Civil Aviation
Ministry to initiate modernisation of the Chennai airport on a par with the and
Mumbai airports and expansion of the Madurai, Tiruchi and airports.
The Hindu - Airport Customs achieves growth of 24.4 per
cent
Special Correspondent CHENNAI:
The Chennai Airport Customs has achieved a 24.4 per cent growth in the first three
quarters, ending December.
C. Rajan, Commissioner of Customs (Airport), told Hindu The that the revenue collection
during the first three quarters stood at Rs. 2,197.19 crore as against Rs. 1,766.14
crore for the corresponding period last year. There was an increase of Rs. 431.05
crore this year, he said.
The target for the financial year 2007-08 was fixed at Rs. 2,890 crore and it was
likely to surpass the last year’s target, he said.
Similarly, the Customs had also recorded a 70 per cent growth in the courier terminal.
While the Customs earned revenue of Rs. 18.76 crore during the first three quarters
of this fiscal, it was only Rs. 10.99 crore during the corresponding period last
year, Mr. Rajan said.
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