Faro Airport’s new terminal building was inaugurated today (July 17) after undergoing €32.8 million of renovations to make it “bigger and better”, said airport bosses.
The ceremony was attended by Prime Minister António Costa as well as Infrastructure and Planning Minister Pedro Marques, the head of VINCI Airports Nicolas Notebaert and the President of the Executive Commission of ANA (Portugal’s airport authority) Carlos Lacerda.
As ANA explains in a statement, the revamp has created more room for passengers, businesses, staff and aeroplanes and was prompted by a need to meet the demands of a larger number of passengers travelling from and to Faro.
In fact, Faro was the national airport that grew the most in 2016 with seven million more passengers than the previous year.
Another reason for the revamp was the increasing number of low-cost airlines flying into Faro and bringing passengers who “tend to spend more time at the airport” due to flight delays and other hold-ups.
There was also a need to boost the airport’s security control to today’s standards.
The terminal – which saw its total area increase from 81,200sqm to 93,120sqm – can now cater for 30 aircraft movements and 3,000 passengers per hour as opposed to the previous 24 and 2,400, respectively.
There is also more parking spaces for planes (up from 30 to 37).
Read more in this week’s Algarve Resident print edition, out on Thursday (July 20).
