The City and Industrial Development Corporation (Cidco) has outrightly rejected the Experts Appraisal Committee’s (EAC) suggestion on shifting of the boundary of the proposed international airport in Navi Mumbai towards the south and west by 100 metres, on the arguments of aeronautical constraints and security.
It also told the EAC at a meeting on Wednesday that the Bureau of Civil Aviation Security had visited and examined the airfield and concluded the diversion of the Ulwe river was required to avoid a security and safety threat to the airport. Besides, the exercise to save the Gadhi river by moving the airport boundary by 100 metres would not yield a positive result, so diverting it was also unavoidable.
Further, Cidco said retaining of natural course of the Ulwe river would cause inefficient functioning of airport facility and give rise to mishaps. A Cidco official, who did not want to be named, told Business Standard: “The Navi Mumbai International Airport (NMIA) has been designed keeping in view the prevailing wind direction, present orography condition of the hilly terrain in and around the airport site and airport design capacity of 60 million passengers per annum (MPPA).”
On EAC’s suggestion to shift the airport site facilities, the official said the total non-aeronautical area proposed measures 415 hectares, of which the developable area is 360 ha. Therefore, the area available to the south of the airport boundary was grossly inadequate for locating of non-aeronautical activity as envisaged. According to Cidco, an area of 1,615 ha had been earmarked in the Navi Mumbai Development Plan as airport zone for the development of airport and allied services/activities.
The official reiterated that the site had several advantages over alternatives — it was also within an hour’s reach from the main city, 78 per cent of the land was in possession of Cidco and the population in the region was willing to re-locate. It was also close to the major InfoTech corridor of Mumbai-Pune.
He added: “Activities like warehouses (42 ha), utilities (14 ha) and housing (15 ha) can be located in the 72 ha available to the south of the airport boundary. The remaining land uses, including offices (78 ha), institutional services (76 ha) and leisure and entertainment (58 hs) can be relocated (though) this will affect the operational feasibility of the airport.”
