DAVAO City’s Francisco Bangoy International Airport is the third busiest airport in the Philippines with a recorded 4.4 million passenger volume in 2018.
The data from the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) showed Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) ranked the busiest airport in the country with 45 million passengers in 2018 and Mactan Cebu Airport comes next with 11.4 million passengers. Davao City recorded 4.2 million domestic passengers and 140,000 international passengers.
Manuel Jamonir, Udenna Infrastructure Corporation assistant vice president for operations engineer, during Habi at Kape media forum Wednesday, April 24, said despite having the third largest passenger volume, the city still lags behind international traffic.
Thus, the P48.8 billion unsolicited airport project proposal estimates traffic to reach 15.5 million by 2050 for both domestic and foreign passengers.
“We are very optimistic with this project proposal, considering that Davao as a Mice (meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions) hub of Mindanao, as a tourist destination and others, Davao will be a major player in the aviation,” Jamonir said.
“One of our strategic initiatives is to develop more routes from Davao to the rest of the world,” he added.
As the company expects 15.5 million passengers at the end of the concession period, existing facilities of the airport are proposed to be widened and improved.
Among the proposed development are Air Transport Movement (ATM) which is currently nine ATMS per hour, was proposed to be 35 ATMS per hour; the 24,780 square meter-passenger terminal building to be 64,800 square meters; four departure gates to be 11; peak-hour passenger capacity of 1,552 to be 4,799; and car parking area of 17,460 square meters to be 29,500 square meters.
Jamonir also mentioned that due to the culture of the Filipinos, they will also develop a pedestrian plaza which could accommodate more people for greeters or family of passengers.
At present, Udenna has been following the timeline of their project. This month, they are working on with National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) approval of negotiation, the result of the negotiation is expected on July.