CDC allots P280M for terminal expansion

The Clark Development Corp. (CDC) is allocating around P280 million to expand its existing terminal for low-cost carriers and to conduct a new feasibility study for a separate terminal for regular commercial airlines.

This was disclosed last Friday by CDC president Antonio Ng during a press briefing on recent developments in the Clark Special Economic Zone.

According to Ng, the CDC plans to spend P200 million to expand its existing passenger terminal at the Diosdado Macapagal International Airport (DMIA) to be able to accommodate up to 2.5 million passengers per annum from its current capacity of only one million passengers per annum.

However, the expansion of the existing terminal would only service low-cost carriers.

He also said that the CDC wants to construct a separate terminal for regular commercial airlines.

He also said that the CDC wants to have the new terminal operational by 2012 in anticipation of a spillover from the Ninoy Aquino International Airport.

A feasibility study will have to made regarding the new terminal.

The study would recommend the location, size and other details and requirements of the planned terminal.

Thus, for the feasibility study alone, Ng disclosed, the CDC is allocating $1.5 million or about P77 million.

The CDC, Ng said, would have to conduct a bidding for the feasibility study.

Ng was unaware of any previous study regarding plans to make use of the DMIA as an alternate international airport.

During the time of former president Fidel Ramos, the government had already raised the possibility of transferring the international airport from the existing NAIA to Clark to decongest Metro Manila.

The plan was tied to the development of the CSEZ and a Manila-Clark railway system.

According to Ng there are already at least six low cost carriers using the DMIA.

These are Asiana Airlines, Air Asia Berhad, China Rich Airlines, Far Eastern Airlines, Tiger Airways and Trans Global Airlines.

Logistic provider United Parcel Service and two other feeder cargo airlines - Yangtze River Express and Pacific East Asia Cargo - also use the DMIA.