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New boarding area at Liberia airport nearly ready December 20, 2006 By José Pablo Ramírez Vindas of the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The work is not finished yet, but transportation officials inaugurated a new boarding and waiting area at Daniel Oduber airport in Liberia Tuesday.
The officials said they expect 400,000 passengers to go through the facilities in 2007, a 28 percent jump from 2006.
The construction is 1,500 square meters or 16,146 square feet. The structure is hung on steel trusses similar to those used for airplane hangers. The project is the result of a $600,000 donation from various firms in the area and a $500,000 investment by the government.
Back The agency involved is the Ministerio de Obras Públicas y Transporte and its Consejo Técnico de Aviación Civil.
In addition to the departure area, the structure will house 22 counters for various airlines, individual offices for the companies, baggage transportation, control points and X-ray facilities.
Karla González, the transport minister, said that work continues to develop a new terminal. This will be a $15 million project, and bidding for the job is expected to begin in March.
The new structure can hold 450 persons comfortably when the whole roof is completed. By Jan. 30, officials hope to have the new luggage area and x-ray system in service.
Officials also plan to air condition the existing terminal building that now will be used mainly for arrivals. The consejo also is investing some $51,000 in setting up a space for an immigration checkpoint.
The growth of Daniel Oduber airport has been a success story, even though growth was much quicker than expected. In 2000 the airport handled only a handful of charter flights. Even in October 2002 only 503 tourists arrived at the airport, compared to 49,012 at Juan Santamaría in Alajuela. Now scheduled flights by major companies are routine, thanks in part to efforts by the Abel Pacheco administration, other donations by local businesses and the intensive construction of tourist destinations in the area.
Monthly arrivals of tourists range from 30,000 to 50,000.
The latest addition is a direct flight from Los Angeles, California, that Delta Air Lines inaugurated Saturday. The airport is in Guanacaste and now serves as the gateway to tourist resorts along the Pacific coast of the Nicoya Peninsula.
Arrivals have been down at Daniel Oduber this year, and some people blame the crowded conditions tourists faced when they got there. Some also attribute the dip to the state of the economy in the United States, the area’a biggest market. |
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