The foundation stone of the airport was laid by the Prime Minister in November 2016. This will be the second airport in the state after the Dabolim airport in South Goa.

The development comes in the wake of the Centre’s constant endeavour of providing world-class infrastructure and transport facilities across the country.

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It is developed at a cost of around ₹2,870 crore.

The airport has been built on the theme of sustainable infrastructure and has solar power plant, green buildings, LED lights on the runway, besides rainwater harvesting, state of the art sewage treatment plant with recycling facilities, among other such facilities.

It has adopted some of the best-in-class technologies like 3-D Monolithic Precast buildings, StabilRoad, Robomatic Hollow precast walls, 5G compatible IT infrastructure. 

As per PMO’s statement, “Some of the features of the airport include runway capable of handling world’s largest aircrafts, 14 parking bays along with night parking facility for aircrafts, self-baggage drop facilities, state of the art and independent air navigation infrastructure, among others.”

Initially, phase I of the Airport will cater to around 4.4 million passengers per annum (MPPA), which can be expanded to a saturation capacity of 33 MPPA.

The airport management told PTI that, “With a capacity of handling 44 lakh passengers per annum, which is scalable to 330 lakh, the greenfield international airport at Mopa in North Goa is expected to stimulate the state’s GDP and increase job opportunities.”

The airport is expected to boost the socio-economic development of the state and serve the needs of the tourism industry. It has the potential of serving as a key logistics hub, directly connecting many domestic and international destinations. It is also planned for the airport to have multi-modal connectivity.

“While being a world-class airport, the airport will also provide visitors a feel and experience of Goa. The airport has extensively used Azulejos tiles, which are native to Goa. The food court also recreates the charm of a typical Goan cafe. It will also have a designated area for a curated flea market where local artisans and craftsmen will be encouraged to display and market their wares,” the statement said.

IndiGo will run 12 daily and a total of 168 weekly new flights and will connect to eight cities across the country. Go First will operate 42 direct flights per week, connecting Mumbai, Hyderabad and Bengaluru from the new international airport.