Runways on highways project likely to pose security threats?

NEW DELHI: The Centre’s plan to construct an airport where the airstrip would double up as a highway could prove to be a commercial disaster and a security nightmare,

NEW DELHI: The Centre’s plan to construct an airport where the airstrip would double up as a highway could prove to be a commercial disaster and a security nightmare, experts said.

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Road transport and highways minister Nitin Gadkari recently said that such an airport was already being built in Rajasthan. The government would build more such airports in hilly and border areas, including Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya and Tripura, he had said.

Gadkari’s announcement took aviation ministry officials by surprise. Officials at the Directorate General of Civil Aviation and the Airports Authority of India said no such proposal has ever been discussed.

“This (plan) sounds silly, especially at a time when terror attacks have taken place at Brussels and Istanbul airports,” said an official of the Bureau of Civil Aviation Security.

Aviation minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju had last month warned state governments to strengthen security at airports.

“There are examples of highways used as airbases, for military purposes, during critical times,” said Kapil Kaul, South Asia CEO of aviation consultancy Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation. “Road-runway has limited commercial feasibility, but is a good idea and could be considered selectively subject to viability. Gibraltar International airport is used for commercial air traffic and road traffic as the main road intersects with the runway.”

Landing a jet on a highway, however, is very different from using a civilian airport runway as a highway, said experts. “For an airport you need air traffic control, terminal building, hangars, taxiway bridges, scan baggages, frisk people and much more,” said a security expert.