Turkish minister says Istanbul needs new airport

Turkey’s transportation minister said on Friday that a new airport in the commercial hub of Istanbul was inevitable.

Friday, 17 December 2010 15:20

Turkey’s transportation minister said on Friday that a new airport in the commercial hub of Istanbul was inevitable.

Binali Yildirim said that there will be around 150 million passenger traffic in Istanbul by 2023, and only two airports, including Ataturk and Sabiha Gokcen international airports, could not meet this traffic.

“Therefore, a new airport is inevitable in Istanbul,” Yildirim said during a meeting in Istanbul on increasing importance of Sabiha Gokcen International Airport in air transportation.

Sabiha Gokcen Airport suffered financial loss between 2001 and 2004. The total passenger traffic at the airport was 130,217 in 2002 but it reached to 10.2 million by November 2010.

Istanbul’s second airport Sabiha Gokcen hosted 6.27 million passengers in the first seven months of 2010, up 94 percent from the same period a year earlier.

The airport almost caught last year’s passenger number of 6.6 million in the first seven months of 2010. 4.2 million of total passengers used domestic flights. The number of domestic passengers rose 92 percent.

International passengers also increased 98 percent to 1.99 million. In July only, Sabiha Gokcen hosted 1.27 million passengers.

Sabiha Gokcen International Airport, situated on the Asian side of Istanbul, opened in 2001. In 2007, ISG, a consortium of Malaysia Airports Holdings, India’s GMR Infrastructure and Turkey’s Limak clinched the rights to manage Istanbul’s second airport with a 1.9 billion-euro bid.

AA