Tainan County Magistrate Su Huan-chih's (
A transportation ministry official yesterday spoke favorably of the Kaohsiung airport expansion project as a means to solve logistics problems faced by high-tech firms in the southern part of Taiwan. This casts doubt over the necessity Su's more elaborate proposed facility.
Lee Lung-wen (李龍文), director of the ministry's Department of Navigation and Aviation, said the expansion project is mainly to improve Kaohsiung Harbor, Hsiaokang International Airport infrastructure and the traffic connection network between the harbor and the airport.
Under the project, the main runway at Hsiaokang Airport will be extended by 330m, enabling it to accommodate Boeing 747 cargo planes, Lee said.
Lee made the remarks after the Council for Economic Planning and Development on Monday commissioned the transportation ministry to come up with an evaluation proposal by late April.
According to the Civil Aviation Association, the extension of the runway will take place between 2009 and 2010, with a total budget amounting to NT$3.29 billion (US$94 million).
Under a project to set up a container center planned by Kaohsiung Harbor Administration, an offshore container center would be established off Chiching, Kaohsiung, to deal with the trend of bigger container vessels and to ensure Kaohsiung's place as a sea traffic and transshipment center, the ministry said.
The total development budget will be NT$59.4 billion, and planning and construction will last from 2002 to 2021.
On Monday, Su told council officials that the proposal to expand Kaohsiung airport is not practical since the facility cannot accommodate Boeing 747s because its runway would be too short.
Instead, Su touted his plan to construct an international airport in Tainan will have 4,000m runway and would be able to transport 120,000 tonnes of cargo annually.
A final decision on the Tainan proposal is scheduled for June, said Chang Jin-sheng (張景森), the council's vice chairman.
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