Two villages in Kanchipuram district, Pannur and Parandur, have been shortlisted to house the second airport for Tamil Nadu’s capital.
The state government suggested four places—Tirupporur, Parandur, Pannur, and Padalam—to the Airports Authority of India (AAI) for Chennai’s second airport. The existing Meenambakkam airport is struggling to handle the ever-increasing rush, despite modernisation plans by the AAI.
A formal announcement on the location of the new greenfield airport will be announced by chief minister M K Stalin in the next few days.
A delegation led by industries minister Thangam Thenarasu met union civil aviation minister Jyotiraditya Scindia and discussed the location for the second airport. Sources told DH that the Centre approved both locations and asked the state to decide.
After inspecting all four locations, the centre short-listed Pannur and Parandur in neighbouring Kanchipuram district for the new greenfield airport. While Pannur is 60 km from Chennai, Parandur is around 75 km.
“Chief Minister M K Stalin will take the final call on the location,” Thenarasu said.
Pannur is close to Sriperumbudur, the industrial town that is home to global majors such as Hyundai, Salcomp and Dell, and the Chennai-Bengaluru highway. However, Parandur is also being considered, sources said.
While the number of flights and daily footfall have increased manifold over the years, Chennai has been bereft of a swanky airport when compared with Bengaluru and Hyderabad. The AAI has been expanding the terminal buildings at the existing airport to cater to the ever-increasing rush; but a new airport is long overdue.
The government’s 2006 plan to construct a greenfield airport in Sriperumbudur, just outside Chennai, did not take off due to a slew of factors—including opposition from Pattali Makkal Katchi, an ally of the then Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) government. Efforts in this regard by the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam government between 2011 and 2021 also did not fructify.
Besides Chennai, Tamil Nadu has five operational airports at Tiruchirapalli, Madurai, Coimbatore, Thoothukudi, and Salem. The state government has now commissioned a study to explore the feasibility of setting up an airport in the industrial city of Hosur, located just outside Bengaluru.
In an answer to a question raised by DMK MP P Wilson in Rajya Sabha on July 25, minister of state for civil aviation Gen (Retired) V K Singh said the AAI found Parandur and Pannur comparatively more feasible for development of an airport.
“AAI has forwarded the pre-feasibility report to Tamil Nadu Industrial Development Corporation Limited advising them to carry out Obstacle Limitation Surface survey and charting work at the two identified sites,” he said.