Arab News: King Abdul Aziz International Airport (KAIA) in Jeddah will have a new state-of-the-art terminal with 74 jet bridges to receive both foreign and Saudia planes, Abdullah Ruhaimy, president of the General Authority for Civil Aviation (GACA), announced. The new terminal will be a boon for international and domestic tourism.
Speaking to reporters after signing an agreement with Aéroports de Paris Company of France to provide design and engineering services for the first phase of KAIA's development project, Ruhaimy said the new airport terminal is designed to receive 30 million passengers annually and would be ready by 2012.
Crown Prince Sultan, deputy premier and minister of defense and aviation, witnessed the signing of the agreement, which is valued at SR514.9 million ($ 137 million).
Ruhaimy and Pierre Graff, chairman and CEO of ADP, signed the pact for the new airport, which will replace the present Northern and Southern Terminals.
The new terminal, according to an official GACA statement, will receive aircraft of varying sizes, including 555-seat A380 planes. It will also have a new air control tower with advanced aviation systems and an air cargo village with an annual capacity of three million tons in addition to new tarmacs and aircraft parking facilities.
ADP will design a railway station, which is to be established adjacent to passenger lounges, a multistory car parking building, a general plan for maintenance facilities, roads leading to the new terminal, an internal road network, aircraft parking areas and new tarmacs, as well as investment and commercial areas.
"The main objective of this airport development project is to make KAIA a central airport that would link the Kingdom's east with the west, and become a major hub for the distribution of passengers," Ruhaimy said. "It will also meet the requirements of the new generation of giant aircraft," he added.
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