Delhi Airport recently served a literal evacuation notice to airlines operating out of Terminal 1, asking them to move 30% of their flights to Terminal 2 by the end of October 2017. On the back of this move, the Delhi Airport has today revealed their master plan for Terminal 1 and how they intend to increase capacity there.

We had first written about the expansion of the Delhi Airport last year, and this sticks more or less to the numbers, except the timelines have moved a bit.

First, some bullet points on the capacity building:

• Capacity of Terminal 1 will go up from 20 million to 40 million passengers. This will be on the back of the area of the terminal almost tripling from the current 60000 square metres to 169000 square metres. Terminal 1C and Terminal 1D which are the arrival and departure terminals right now will be combined in the process.
• 22 Aerobridges to be installed.
• There will be 13 entry gates to the terminal, instead of the current 8.
• One more bank of check-in counters to come up to take it to 5 banks of check-in counters.
• From 12 Common User Self Service terminals, this will go up to 35 installations as well.
• Hand baggage will be processed quicker with an automatic tray retrieval system to be installed, a-la-Terminal 5 at Heathrow. This would increase the speed and the efficiency as well, what with the need to stamp hand baggage gone now.
• Baggage belts will go up to 10 from the current 8, and also longer to be able to bring more bags on the belt quicker.
• The Baggage Management system will undergo an overhaul, and a complete rework will be done to make it airport wide rather than airline-wise.

The airport also intends to increase the capacity of T3 to 45 million pax per annum from the current 34 million passenger per annum. The airport intends to start working on Terminal 4 after they have completed Terminal 1 rework and demolished T2 after that. The new Terminal 1 is intended to come on board by 2020 and the Terminal 4 will go live by 2025.

Terminal 2, which is the go-between for the time being, will have reasonable capacity as well, and will look and feel like T3.

• 4 entry gates
• 74 check-in counters
• 9 X-ray machines
• 6 Aerobridges + 4 bus gates
• 6 baggage belts

Not just that, Delhi Metro intends to put up a train station under the new T1 as well within a short while, when the Delhi Metro Stage 4 plan kicks in.

Bottomline

Overall a rosy picture out there. With the big growth in Aviation coming up in India, one does need a few mega airports. Mumbai does not have the space to expand, so Delhi it will have to be. Bangalore is also growing slowly at the moment. So, we should be glad at least one airport is growing big to be able to make Indian carriers help with a base. I sure do hope we will see a better picture than this after the new airport terminal opens up…It literally looks like an Indian bus shelter.

What do you think about the plans for the Delhi Airport? I’m sure looking forward to see the new terminals in a few years time…