Anantapur: The Kadapa Airport will soon get a facelift to provide night landing facility.
Since last year, TruJet Airlines flies in and out of the airport only during the day to Vijayawada and Tirupati since last year.
Collector Hari Kiran said the government was taking necessary measures to start the night landing facility so that more aircraft can operate from the Kadapa Airport. The district administration has initiated beautification work at the airport and is developing connecting roads to Kadapa headquarters.
The airport work was completed long ago and operation of flights was stopped twice because of the poor response from passengers. The Bengaluru-based airlines, however, has been operating services. The Airlines also offers free transport facility for passengers to Kadapa headquarters.
The Kadapa airport is spread over 669.5 acres and was upgraded at a cost of '42 crore that was inaugurated by former Civil Aviation Minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju and Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu two years ago.
The airport terminal building has a capacity to handle 100 peak hour passengers at a time and the can accommodate 3 ATR-72 type of aircraft.
The Airport was constructed in 1953, and initially had a 3,500 ft (1,067 m) runway. In the 1980s, Vayudoot operated services to Kadapa from Hyderabad.
In 2009, a new 6,562 ft × 150 ft (2,000 m × 46 m) runway was completed under the Build, Operate and Transfer basis at a cost of '21 crore. In addition, a 11-km long compound wall was constructed with an outlay of '24 crore. In the second phase, an Air Traffic Control building, passenger terminal, parking bays and internal roads were built at a cost of '13 crore. Other facilities were developed at an estimated cost of '8 crore.
