Varanasi: Lal Bahadur Shastri International Airport in Varanasi is getting a major upgrade with a Rs 2,870 crore project, making it the first airport in India to have a national highway running underneath its runway. To facilitate this, the airport authority has started taking an 8-hour block from Monday night, from 11:30 pm to 7:30 am, till Oct.Talking to TOI, LBSI airport director Puneet Gupta said, “This block between 11.30 pm and 7.30 am started from Monday night and will be utilised for major technical work to strengthen the runway for the landing of heavy category aircraft, installing an advanced airfield ground lighting system, and an Instrument Landing System (ILS). This block will continue till October, and the period may extend in case of further need.” Following Union cabinet’s approval in June 2024, the major expansion plan for the LBSI airport in PM Narendra Modi’s parliamentary constituency started taking shape on the ground in Jan 2025.To double the capacity, work on a new terminal started in Jan 2025. By mid 2025, work on expanding the runway to 4,075 mt from the existing length of 2,750 mt, with the national highway running under it to allow handling big cargo and jumbo planes, also started at a cost of Rs 2,870 crore. With the completion of this project, the LBSI will see its annual passenger handling capacity rise from 39 lakh to 99 lakh.The National Highway Authority of India also started work on the construction of a tunnel to make Varanasi’s airport the first in India to have a highway under its runway.“We are targeting completion of the entire project by the end of December. To achieve the target, the works proposed to strengthen the existing runway for the operation of heavy aircraft, and other infrastructure-related works, including the installation of lighting, made this block a must,” said the airport director, adding that, as the number of flights is very high during the day, it was decided to take the block at night when there are fewer flights and disturbance to flight operations will remain minimum.
