The government is planning to invest approximately NT$300 billion (US$10.3 billion) for the construction of a third terminal and other infrastructure at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport, the Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA) said yesterday.
The plan marks the nation’s largest investment in air transportation service in the past decade.
The CAA-drafted Guidelines Governing the Development at the Airport Park (機場園區發展綱要計畫) was approved by the Executive Yuan last week. CAA Deputy -Director-General Chen Tien-tsyh (陳天賜) said the government aims to turn the nation’s largest international airport into one of the most important hubs in northeast Asia.
According to Chen, both the CAA and the Taoyuan International Airport Corp (TIA) will jointly execute the guidelines. The CAA will be responsible for acquiring land needed for the Airport Park, while the TIA will be in charge of designing and constructing Terminal 3 and the airport’s third runway, he said.
Aside from building a new terminal and runway, Chen said the NT$300 billion budget would also pay for the costs of expropriating private properties in the area and building other transportation infrastructure.
Based on the guidelines, annual passenger traffic at the Taoyuan airport is expected to reach 58.9 million per year by 2030 and cargo handling is expected to top 4.48 million tonnes.
The number of aircraft arriving at and departing from the airport is also expected to reach 467,000 per year within 20 years.
Chen said the entire Airport Park area is 1,249 hectares. He said the airport would need an additional 745 hectares to accommodate all the facilities specified in the guidelines, adding that the estimated costs of acquiring the lands could potentially top NT$59.5 billion.
The newly acquired land would be used to build the third runway, depots and tarmacs for both passenger and cargo jets, aircraft maintenance zones and the airport free-trade zone, he said.
According to the CAA’s preliminary design, the third runway will be located at the northern part of Airport Park, which will be 1,200m in distance and accommodate large aircraft, such as the Airbus 380.
Terminal 3, along with the satellite boarding areas, will be able to accommodate 43 million passengers per year. Fan Hsiao-lun (范孝倫), director of CAA’s aerodrome engineering division, said Terminal 1 can accommodate 15 million passengers per year after renovations are completed this year.
Terminal 2, meanwhile, has a capacity to handle 17 million passengers per year, Fan said.
Fan added it would take the CAA at least one or two years before it can actually start expropriating the land, adding the government’s development project would all have to be reviewed by the Environmental Impact Assessment Committee.
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