Dabolim Airport a chink in Goa’s tourism armoury

Troubles plaguing the new Dabolim Airport terminal seem to be never ending since the day the new terminal building was made operational. The truth behind the spanking new building has started coming to light at intervals. From substandard work posing a high risk to airport users (passengers as well as staff working at the Airport) to other various infrastructure defects and lack of amenities, everything is getting exposed day by day but does anyone care? Constructed at a cost of Rs 345 crore, the new building was proposed and built to handle peak hour passenger traffic at the rate of about 2,750 passengers a day. The foundation stone for the terminal was laid on 21 February 2009. The project began in May 2010 and construction of the terminal began in May 2011 with the inauguration on 3 December 2013 by the Union Civil Aviation Minister, Ajit Singh, in the presence of former Goa Governor BV Wanchoo and former Chief Minister and present Defence Minister, Manohar Parrikar and other state and national leaders. The Airport Authority of India had several ambitious plans with the 62,000 square metre four-level terminal building that was designed to cater to five million passengers annually. To overcome congestion, the new building had various proposed facilities including 75 check-in counters, 22 immigration counters for departures, 18 immigration counters for arrivals, 14 security check booths and 8 customs counters and other passenger as well as airport users amenities including parking. However, except for booths and counters, majority of the proposed amenities remained only on paper. Even after the inauguration of the building, it was not made operational as the work was still ongoing and the burden to resolve the issue started piling up day by day. “Six months after the formal inauguration of the airport, actual operations at the new building commenced. This delay continues even today and that is why there is a whole lot of delay in providing facilities at the airport which is not a good sign,” said Kiran Naik, a local from Vasco. AAI had promised facilities of multi-level parking in order to eliminate a long standing problem of parking at the airport. However, due to some security issues, parking at the airport is still a major headache for airport users and today one can see a line of cars parked all along the national highway 17-B. Similarly, the building was planned without any exit plan. Surprisingly the building was made operational and the exit points from the airport proved to be nothing but a death trap as outward traffic from the new terminal compulsorily has to merge into traffic speeding downhill towards Varunapuri from the current airport junction and only due to these reasons, the state government proposed and also started the work of a grade separator in order to eliminate the menace. “The exit from the new terminal into NH17 is a blind entrance where drivers will either wait to see regular NH traffic moving on to merge their vehicles with the highway traffic and cause traffic jams in the terminal or be susceptible to collision from outbound vehicles from the airport junction,” complaints Pramod Amonkar, a resident from Vasco. Complaints about the lack of amenities especially outside the airport are another major issue at the airport at Dabolim. Any airport has to have toilet facilities outside the airport building for people but the rule does not seem to apply to the Dabolim airport. There aren’t any canteen facilities either. “The facilities at the airport are worse than any small railway station. Despite the fact that the airport is used by a number of people, there is no toilet facility for passengers and taxi operators outside the airport. To top it all, the building is said to be infested with mosquitoes. The canteen and existing stalls sell only beverages and that too at a high cost,” said tourist taxi president, Sanjay Naik. Even for the airlines staff, policemen at the Dabolim airport, customs officials and others working at the new airport, there are a lot of hardships they have to face. The new international airport is just a show piece with several defects which is not good for tourism in the state. Surprisingly, all such issues have been repeatedly raised in the Airport Advisory committee meeting but solutions are awaited.