The Nepal government on Sunday awarded the contract to do a detailed feasibility study of a second international airport at Nijgadh-Dumarwana of Bara district to Landmark Worldwide Company, Korea.
The feasibility study will start in April and last 10 months. "In the first phase, there will be a detailed feasibility study and design feasibility study," said Binay B. Rawal, Landmark's Nepal representative. According to him, for the detailed feasibility study and design feasibility study, the company would invest US$ 3.8 million.
With a total investment of US$ 600 million in the first phase and US$ 1 billion until the final stage, the project is to be operated under the "build, own, operate, transfer" (BOOT) model. The proposed new airport will have two parallel runways.
The project will encompass an area of 80 sq km out of which 40 sq km will be occupied by the airport and a town will be founded on the rest. As per the design feasibility, the airport will be constructed under the forecast growth of passenger traffic in the future. The airport will be constructed citing over two to three million passengers by the year 2015, so the existing capacity of the airport will be sufficient to accommodate the growing number of air passengers.
In July 1997, NEPECON-RID had carried out a pre-feasibility study on a second international airport. During that time, pre-feasibility studies of all the probable airport sites were carried out and Nijgadh was found to be economically viable.
In 2007, The Nepal government had requested the US government to do a feasibility study and prepare a detailed proposal.
During the time, the American Trade and Development Office had shown interest to develop the project. In 2007, the then Tourism Minister Prithvi Subba Gurung had approved the programme, however, government instability pushed the project into an indeterminate state.
Subsequently, the then Tourism Minister Hisila Yami continued the programme during the Maoist-led government, which pushed the programme to make clear the negotiation procedure with the interested company. "The project was stuck for more than eight months during that time," Rawal said. |
