Expanded Bali airport expected to be at full capacity by 2017
Monday, 25th June, 2012
The Transportation Ministry predicts that Bali’s Ngurah Rai International Airport will reach its maximum capacity of 20 million passengers per year by 2017.
The expansion that is currently taking place has occupied all the land belonging to the airport operator. Acquiring more land in that area will impose a very high cost.
Bali airport is estimating the growth in the number of passengers of 12-15% per year.
Last year Ngurah Rai Airport reached 12.7 million using with 52% using domestic flights amd 48% international flights.
If the island would need to build another airport with at least two runways if it wanted to have a greater number of arrivals. He said research into a new airport in Buleleng, in the north of the island, had been completed. The research suggested that the new airport could be built in the east part of the regency.
Bali has seen a significant increase in the number of tourist arrivals this year. As of April, the number had risen by 10.74% to 915,00 tourists, with Ngurah Rai as the main point of entry. This number is already 30% of the year’s target of 3 million people.