Iran plans major expansion for its flagship airport in Tehran

Mohammad Amirani, CEO of the company, said on Tuesday that the expansion project at Mehrabad Airport will include a new terminal and a significant increase in the number of parking slots at the airport.  

Amirani said the expansion has been enabled by a government decision to allocate nearly 10 hectares of land, located near the airport, to the project.

He said the lands were previously owned by the Iranian customs office, adding that the Iranian airport company has won a legal battle to own the lands for the purpose of carrying out the expansion project at Mehrabad.

The official said that a new terminal covering an area of 120,000 square meters will be added to the airport, adding that the construction of the terminal would take three to five years.

Amirani said that the number of plane parking slots in Mehrabad would also increase from 60 to 160 as a result of the expansion.

He said that the project would enable the airport to respond to the rising demand for air travel in Iran in the next 20 years.

Opened in 1938 in the west of the capital Tehran, the Mehrabad Airport was the primary airport in the city for both domestic and international flights until the Imam Khomeini International Airport was inaugurated in 2007.

The facility has four active terminals, which mostly handle domestic traffic, and is still viewed as Iran’s main airport.

Experts believe the expansion project in Mehrabad would play a major role in Iran’s plans to become a regional transit hub for passenger and cargo traffic./isna