The RA Civil Aviation Central Board (CACB) is going to make serious investments in the airport of Gyumri. During an interview, Head of the CACB Artyom Movsesyan said that this issue has been periodically brought up ever since he was appointed as head: “But the main reason was the foggy weather at the end of last year. We have presented a report to the RA government and president on this situation in December, and in January the president ordered to implement this program”.
There are rumors flying around that this program is being implemented due to the fact that recently the head of the “Zvartnots” airport is not making any investments for the airport.
Mr. Movsesyan doesn’t agree with this:
“No, these two airports are located in different climatic areas. Each of these two airports is open in all kinds of weather conditions. “Shirak” is going to be an alternative airport. Besides that according to the existing concession agreement with the “Zvartnots” airport board, “Shirak” airport can only organize flights to CIS countries. The problem is that when making a contract with the government the party said to the government that besides CIS countries they don’t want to have any competitor in the country to have international flights, otherwise their income would be cut down. But in case of major conditions “Shirak” can handle flights as an alternative airport. Currently “Zvartnots” is a second-class airport, and as for “Shirak”, it doesn’t have any class. Due to the program and plans works we will be able to make “Shirak” a first class airport (second class is the highest classification – K.T.). But in case of providing first-class conditions we will be able to handle all kinds of flights at the “Shirak” airport. I think in this case “Shirak” will handle more flights, which will support the development of the aviation field. In most cases citizens of Northern districts use the airport in Tbilisi. This problem will be solved too”, said Artyom Movsesyan.
They haven’t chosen any company who will asphalt the flight apron. “But I think it will be better for us to choose one of the two asphalting companies of Gyumri. By doing this we will provide citizens of Gyumri with work as well as solve some technical problems there”, said Artyom Movsesyan, and added that he thinks it is impossible to hand over the “Shirak” airport to any foreign company.
According to Mr. Movsesyan there will also be VIP service in “Shirak” airport, but they are not going to install air navigation facilities there: “There is no need of doing this for a first-class airport. First class airports need at least 600 meters visibility, which is provided by the existing lighting facilities”.
Last year this airport was able to substitute “Zvartnots” airport in foggy weather. According to Mr. Movsesyan “the airport administration worked very well in that period. Besides that, during that time the CACB representatives were always present there. Of course, there were some violations, but the situation was in control. People complained that taxi drivers increased the prices for their services rapidly in that period. I personally talked to the head of Gyumri police department in order to not risk getting profit out of all that”.
If “Shirak” becomes a first-class airport, of course it will influence positively on other fields too: “If the airport operates actively, other substructures will develop too. This will support transportation, tourism and food businesses to develop too”.
Recently it was written in the press that after handing the “Zvartnots” airport administration to Eduardo Ernekyan, the new administration doesn’t make good investments to install certain modern technical facilities. Is this true? “They have fulfilled their requirements until now. This is wrong. The problem is the following: the manager of “Zvartnots” had to take certain steps to comply the service at the airport with international standards. For instance the arrivals hall is too small and passengers feel uncomfortable when they arrive there. During an interview, the new manager said that he had decided to build a new terminal, because whatever they do they can’t make reforms in the existing terminal and make it comfortable for handling the certain number of flights. They started to build a new terminal in June, 2004, and the ground floor will start working by the end of this year. We should appreciate this work. On the other hand passenger handling service quality is not high, which we have always outlined. People always say that their bags are not weighted right and so on. I don’t agree with people who blame “Zvartnots” in not making investments. Besides the terminal, they have also applied a very good new security system, which has been audited and examined by ICAO and ECAC and there are high evaluations. Here they have made serious investments too. They have installed 90 mobile and immobile cameras, which also helped us to register theft cases which didn’t even concern our field (for instance car theft in parking areas). Now they want to apply a system of finger-print check, which will enable the services work easier and passengers will enter the departures area easily. Now they check this method on flights to London, later it will be applied till the end of this year. This solves numerous certain aviation security problems. The next investment is for reconstructing the flight runway, which be finished this year”.
The RA CACB head, Artyom Movsesyan, informed us that the total sum of the investments of “Armenia International Airports” CJSC during the period of 2002-2004 in reconstructing the flight runway, installing new aviation security systems, reconstructing the existing terminal and building a new one covers 11 million dollars. This company is going to provide more than 23 million dollars for the same job in 2005. But this information is not final yet, because the airport manager has to present reports to the government, where they have to write all their expenses starting from reconstruction to current expenses.