Construction could start before the end of the year on a second runway at Narita, allowing more room for regional services at the international hub. According to one airport official, Japan's ministry of transport was expected to approve the application before the start of December.
The proposed 2,180m (7,150ft) second runway will parallel Narita's existing 4,000m runway, allowing about 176 more movements per day. Mostly it will handle mid-sized jets in the Boeing 767 class, operating on regional routes. Plans for a longer runway were delayed because of objections by local farmers. The shorter runway will skirt their farms.
Narita aims to complete the new runway by early 2002, with its opening slated for May of that year before the soccer World Cup finals co-hosted by Japan and South Korea.
The government also plans to select the site for a third Tokyo airport next year. It has narrowed its choices to three, one of which is a floating runway in Tokyo Bay. Mitsubishi and Sumitomo Heavy Industries plan to assemble a prototype floating runway for test landings and takeoffs near Yokosuka, southwest of Tokyo. They estimate that building a a floating air port would cost less than Osaka's Kansai. Earlier this year, the transport ministry decided that Tokyo's third airport would need to serve international as well as domestic flights.
Finally, Tokyo's Haneda airport plans to open "runway B" by next July on reclaimed land in Tokyo Bay. By then the ministry of transport will have allocated 62 new slots among domestic airlines. Incumbents and start-ups such as Skymark Airlines and Air Do are jockeying for those rights. In the two years after that, Haneda plans to open another 52 domestic slots.
Source: Airline Business
