The new King Abdulaziz International Airport will be ready by the end of this year, said Prince Fahd bin Abdullah, president of General Authority of Civil Aviation, as reported in Arab News. “About 60% of the project has been completed and remaining work will be carried out at a much faster pace to finish on time,” he said after inspecting progress of work at the airport. Prince Fahd said experimental operation of the new airport would start during the first five months of 2015. The new expansion will increase the airport’s annual capacity to 30 million passengers in the first phase and 80 mn in the final phase. The SR27-billion project is designed to make KAIA one of the largest hubs in the world. Spanning an area of 670,000 sqm, the airport will have two new terminals for domestic and international passengers. Prince Fahd said GACA has a plan to train 100 Saudi engineers on the project to help them gain expertise in airport operation and management. “We will also train government employees working at the airport to improve their performance,” the GACA chief said. Finance Minister Ibrahim Al-Assaf, who accompanied the prince during the tour, said the new airport projects in Jeddah and Madinah offer the private sector ample investment opportunity. Source: Travel Daily