On Saturday, December 25, BEGISHEVO AIRPORT SC, a subsidiary of KAMAZ PTC, will celebrate its 50th anniversary.
On December 25, 1971, the first flight from the airstrip of Begishevo was taken by the crew of an An-24 aircraft. This date is considered the birthday of the airport. Now Begishevo is a federally significant international airport. It serves the cities Naberezhnye Chelny, Nizhnekamsk, Yelabuga, etc.
Today the top managers of the airport face the task to increase passenger flow. Almost 600 thous. passengers were transported in 1991, but the collapse of the USSR resulted in a sharp drop in passenger traffic. And since that time Begishevo hadn’t transported more than 500 thous. passengers untill 2017. The year 2018 saw the number of passengers exceeding 777 thous.(2019 – 785 thous.). The previous year turned out to be turbulent for the whole aviation industry because of the epidemiological situation. The volume of passenger flow reached only 430 thous. people.
“Fortunately, we are celebrating our jubilee with almost pre-pandemic performance in terms of passenger traffic. This is the result of everyday hard work of the whole enterprise and support from KAMAZ PTC, our primary shareholder, and the leaders of the republic. This year is planned to be finished with more than 650 thous. transported passengers. I think this is a good figure, with the industry not fully recovered yet,” said Andrey Parfenenko, General Director of BEGISHEVO AIRPORT SC.
According to the head of the company, it is important for Begishevo to link different regions so that passengers could take direct flights to the main popular resorts and large cities, bypassing Moscow’s airport hub. That’s why cooperation with air transporters never ends: the company regularly conducts negotiations, develops beneficial terms for new flights. For instance, a marketing program was introduced to air companies. Under this program, the airport grants discounts on its services, organizes promotion of flights.
To add to this, with support of Tatarstan’s government, much work is being done to subsidize regional passenger flights. Under this program, flights are financed from federal and republican budgets, and also from budgets of destination regions. Therefore, tickets for subsidized flights are always at attractive prices.
“The Begishevo airport celebrates its 50th anniversary surrounded with scaffolding, if I may say so. We are implementing and developing federal, republican and our own projects to upgrade and expand industrial facilities, make passenger service more comfortable, safe and of higher quality. And our priority task is to build a new terminal of international airlines,” said Andrey Parfenenko.
The area of the new three-floored building is more than 8,500 square meters. The project is compliant with the OPTIMUM service level of the IATA LoS (Level of Service) concept with a flow rate of 200 international flight passengers an hour for arrivals and the same rate for departures. The project is 65% implemented: the workers are finishing the façade and the interior, elevators and an escalator are already installed. Besides, the landside was improved and its geometry was modified, the number of parking spaces was increased, now the hotel façade is being renovated.
In 2022, one of acute problems will be solved: a free parking with 410 parking spaces will be built in front of the vehicular entrance to the airport. Moreover, reconstruction of the airstrip is being developed now. Its width will grow from 42 to 45 meters, and its length will be increased from 2,499 to 2,902 meters. These two projects are financed from the budget of the Republic of Tatarstan.
The launch of the new terminal is scheduled for December 2022. All infrastructural changes related to its construction will enable the airport to expand its destination network, accommodate new types of aircrafts (including wide-body ones), attract new air carriers for cooperation and increase passenger traffic. Undoubtedly, this airport building is being constructed primarily to make crossing the state border in both directions comfortable for international flight passengers.
“All our initiatives are supported at all levels, from our owner KAMAZ PTC to the republican and federal authorities, which is a strong credit of trust. It means that they believe in our future, though the air industry is at a low ebb. All our employees, veterans – people who gave their best years to aviation and our airport – contributed to it. I want to thank all employees of the airport for their work. Congratulations on the jubilee, colleagues! And I wish our passengers good health, airiness, mobility and more travels from the Begishevo airport,” said Andrey Parfenenko.