Ahmedabad airport repair to affect operations

The Ahmedabad airport is connected to 11 domestic and nine international destinations by 14 airlines

Tourist traffic is set to be hit in the summer as airlines begin to reschedule or suspend flights from Ahmedabad's Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel International Airport (SVPIA) as its runway will undergo repairs, overdue for two years.  

SVPIA has undertaken partial re-carpeting and repair of its 3.5-km-long runway, and this will be extended fully from April 16. As a result, flights will not operate  between 10 am to 6 pm. According to A K Sharma, director, Airports Authority of India (AAI) at the Ahmedabad airport, the re-carpeting is likely to get over by March 2017.  

While IndiGo has announced suspension of flights that run between 10 am and 6 pm connecting Ahmedabad to Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Kolkata, Goa, Pune, and Indore, Jet Airways will be suspending services for the Mumbai, Delhi, Bhopal and Indore routes.  Announcements from other airlines are awaited. SpiceJet has rescheduled six domestic and two international flights to Chennai, Mumbai, Pune, and Dubai, while it has cancelled flights between Goa and Ahmedabad.

“SpiceJet operates eight domestic and two international flights per day in the current schedule. It has been operating at an average PLF (passenger load factor) of 90 per cent for nine months. The flights have been rescheduled,” a SpiceJet spokesperson said, adding the airline would not raise rate as a result.

“We have not yet heard from any airlines on rescheduling or suspension of flights. Currently, re-carpeting work is on for a small portion of the runway,” said Sharma. Repair work on the entire runway would begin from April 16, he added.

When compared with international airports like Dubai which completed re-carpeting of one of its runways in 2014 in 80 days, the 12 months duration at Ahmedabad airport seems unprecedented. On the other hand, this year other domestic airports that will see runway repair include Amritsar, where work is expected to be completed in 10 months; Indore (six months); and Thiruvananthapuram (three months).

AAI officials at Ahmedabad airport stated on condition of anonymity that as against 40 flights being affected by the repair work, a night time repair work similar to that in Amritsar, would have resulted in about 15 flights being affected.

The seventh-largest airport in the country in terms of passenger handling, Ahmedabad airport is connected to 11 domestic and nine international destinations by 14 airlines, while Amritsar is connected to three domestic and seven international destinations.

The renovation is not likely to hit international traffic as 90 per cent of these operate in the night.

While IndiGo will suspend seven flights from April 16 onwards, Jet Airways will suspend four.

The move is likely to benefit Vadodara's Civil Airport Harni, which could see flight services being re-directed.

Admitting that the re-carpeting was “slightly overdue”, Sharma said re-carpeting at Ahmedabad took place eight years ago. The work is estimated to cost Rs 27 crore, and is set to impact summer tourist inflow and outflow, which had seen a 30 per cent jump last year for the period April to June 2015.

During the period, around 1.5 million passengers flew in and out of Ahmedabad, of which about 355,000 were international passengers.   

Overall, with more than 160 flights operating daily, the average passenger traffic at SVPIA is estimated at 18,000. In 2014-15, the airport handled 5.05 million passengers, 3.83 million domestic and 1.22 million international travellers.

As against this, the Ahmedabad airport handled 4.56 million passengers in 2013-14. AAI estimates the annual passenger handling by Ahmedabad airport to rise up to 6.77 million passengers by 2023-24.

The re-carpeting work is also likely to impact the SVPIA's revenues, which have been growing steadily for the past few years. Apparently, while Gujarat's nine airports including Vadodara, Surat and Rajkot are incurring losses, the Ahmedabad airport has been earning profits of around Rs 30 crore.

Revenue of SVPIA grew by 10 per cent and five per cent in 2013-14 and 2014-15, respectively. From Rs 196 crore in 2012-13, the Ahmedabad airport's revenue, which comes from airport development fee, user development fee and parking charges paid by airlines, grew to Rs 217 crore in 2013-14 and Rs 229 crore in 2014-15.