Noida International Airport to open doors by 2024 end; final touches in progress: CEO

The Noida International Airport is all set to open doors by the end of 2024. Because of its strategic location in the industrial hub of Uttar Pradesh and in the catchment of commercial activity of the NCR, the airport is likely to be a game changer for the region. The second airport in the NCR is also likely to bring ease to commuters for whom it could be more accessible than the Delhi airport. For starters, the airport is likely to cater to 12 million passengers per year in Phase I, which is estimated to grow up to 70 million per year by Phase IV. The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Noida International Airport (by Zurich Airport), Christoph Schnellmann shared a roadmap with Republic in an Exclusive interview. Edited excerpts:

The Noida International airport is expected to start functioning from end of 2024. We are exactly about a year away from the launch. How is the phase-wise growth planned?

We are excited and privileged to be working on this project in Noida. We won the bid at the end of 2019, we have been subsequently working on designing the airport and then identifying a partner for constructing the airport and securing the funds. All of this was successfully concluded in 2021 and 2022. We signed a deal with Tata Projects to construct the airport. For last 15 months, Tata Projects has been building the infrastructure. By the end of 2024, the infrastructure will be ready for creating one passenger terminal and one runway, initially. Also, all the ancillary infrastructure to support the airport will come up. When we open, we will cater to about 12 million passengers and we will have the capacity to fly domestic as well as international flights.

Has there been any initial planning on routes? Which international flights can we expect to take off from Jewar?

We are very excited to bring this capacity to the Delhi region and Western Uttar Pradesh. It will be a gamechanger and have a transformative impact on the region. This will help bring people together to stimulate trade and commerce. We have been having a lot of talks with various airlines, primarily all the domestic airlines as well as the international airlines, at least in Southeast Asia. There is a large interest by carriers, and we are convinced that there will be large domestic networks on the offer on the open as well as the international destinations as well, but ultimately it will be up to the airlines to choose which sites they want to service initially and then others as they want to expand. But primarily we expect a wide network initially both domestically and then internationally.

How soon with the test flights start from the airport?

Test flights mainly to test the navigational equipment will start probably around six months before the formal launch of the airport in the middle of next year.

What is the total number of people employed at the airport right now?

There is not just one party involved in the success of the airport but many parties working together like government agencies, private agencies. All told we now have around 7,000 people working on site in all kinds of functions – planning functions, engineering functions, design functions.

Has your total cost outlay still at Rs 5,730 crore?

We have been convinced that we would be able to open the airport with the funds that have been sanctioned. A lot has happened since 2019 – inflation and Covid-19 are factors which we have come to terms with. The main contracts have been executed on a fixed time, fixed rate basis.

You have designated some 80 acres of land for cargo. How significant will cargo be in driving revenues?

We are excited about the potential for cargo and logistics in the region. I think the airport is incredibly well placed to act as a catalyst for trade and logistics. It is very close to the agricultural hub of Noida and the industrial hub of Uttar Pradesh and there’s excellent road connectivity. Because of that, we have taken a decisive move towards cargo, front and centre. We have allotted around 80 acres or more to the cargo section, providing infrastructure for air cargo as well as providing infrastructure for trucks.

How much passenger load from the Indira Gandhi International Airport is likely to shift to NIA?

We are incredibly encouraged by the growth that we are seeing in aviation in India. Air traffic growth has increased 9 folds in the last 15 years, it is the fastest growing aviation market in the world. Indian aircraft capacity is on a rise with how India and Air India have placed orders and for these airlines to continue to serving Delhi and NCR, we need additional airport capacity, so we are not looking at this as a move at traffic shifting but as an opportunity for further growth. A recent example is Goa. The new Goa airport opened this year essentially. And the network from the new Goa airport is at par with the Dabolim airport and the existing airport has not witnessed any reduction in passengers. We clearly see a need for more airport infrastructure in India, and in Delhi-NCR specifically.

How advanced is NIA going to be in terms of transfer speed and check-ins?

The advantage that we have at Noida International airport is that we built it on green fields and did not have to come to terms with legacy systems. We are going to provide the facility of transfers based on digi-yatra. A lot of what we are doing digitally at the airport is less visible openly but has a lot to do with the data available at the airport, to ensure that as a passenger you don’t miss your connections and that ground handlers at the airport are able to optimise their operations in the interest of providing excellent passenger experience.

Is Zurich Airport planning to build any other airport in India?

At present this is our project, and we are now absolutely committed. Our association with the Indian market goes back to 2008, with the Bangalore airport. We remain interested in growing in this market.