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Third Airport for Bangkok?
July 26th 2019
Construction could start at Nakhon Pathom, west of Bangkok, in 2023 Read More »
While debate continues about expanding Bangkok Suvarnabhumi, the country’s airports bosses have proposed an all-new domestic and international airport in Nakhon Pathom, 50km west of Bangkok. The optimistic timeframe has the facility opening as early as 2025.
U-Tapao, 170 kms south of Bangkok, had been positioned as a distant third airport for Bangkok. Instead, it will be the country’s eastern aviation centre, Transport Minister Saksayam Chidchob said at an International Civil Aviation Organisation meeting in Phuket this week, explaining it would be part of Thailand’s larger Eastern Economic Corridor. U-Tapao is being developed with the construction of a new passenger terminal, a second runway and MRO and crew training facilities.
Civil Aviation Authority of Thailand chief, Chula Sukmanop, asked the new government to resume and speed up construction of Suvarnabhumi’s second terminal, which has been suspended.
Nakhon Pathom’s construction could start in 2023 with its first phase finished in four years, said deputy director-general, Jarun Meesomboon, in a Bangkok Post report. The airport could be in use before the first formal stage is completed, with initial operations commencing within 2-3 years of the start of construction.
The plan envisions initial throughput of one million passengers a year or about 2,740 a day. Design capacity through later expansion would be 25 million annually. Bangkok Suvarnabhumi’s design capacity is 40 million, but it handled 70 million passengers in 2018. The potential at Nakhon Pathom is comparable with airports at Khon Kaen and Surat Thani.
The initial cost estimate for the airport is 20 billion baht (US$648 million) with financing to be a public-private partnership or state-owned. The government expected large private sector interest given an estimated internal rate of return exceeding 20%. Airports of Thailand is the world’s most valuable airport holding company.
The proposal will be submitted to the Transport Ministry with a hearing to be held next month. Resistance to the airport’s construction is expected to be minimal as the site has only 200 households on 400 plots.
