During his short visit to Split and the construction site of the expressway through Kaštela, Minister of Maritime Affairs, Transport and Infrastructure Siniša Hajdaš Dončić also stopped by the Split Airport on Saturday, October 10th 2015, where he commented on the future plans for the second largest airport in Croatia.
He announced that the construction of the new terminal will probably commence in spring 2016, and once it is completed, this airport will increase its capacity to 2 million passengers a year “Estimated value of th new terminal is 450 million kuna, and the Ministry of Civil Engineering should issue construction permit by the end of this month. Public tender will be published immediately and if everything does as planned, I expect the construction works to begin in spring 2016”. Dončić said.
With this new terminal, Split airport will operate according to the highest European standards and it will be able to take more than 2 million passengers per year, and, according to Hajdaš Dončić, state guarantees will not be necessary for its construction: “We decided to exclude the airport from their obligation to deposit their income in the national budget so they will be able to cover most of the cost from the income they’ve accumulated over the last few years while the rest will be covered by a loan from HBOR (Croatian Bank for Reconstruction and Development” he added.
As far as other infrastructural projects in the area are concerned, Kaštela expressway should be completed by September 2016 which is extremely important for this entire region considering more than 25 000 cars pass this route every day during tourist season. Furthermore, highly anticipated and much needed Čiovo bridge will also be completed by September 2016.
According to Minister Hajdaš Dončić, total value of investments in these three capital projects in the Kaštela / Trogir area is 1 billion kuna, which is the largest investment in this area in the last few decades.
Now lets just hope all deadlines will be met since all of us who are regularly stuck in traffic either on the existing road through Kaštela or on the Čiovo bridge during summer, cannot wait one day longer, let alone few months longer should there be another postponement.
