GIFF JOHNSON
Landfill work ongoing between Katoj Park and the airport terminal is to create space for a new parking lot at the airport and also to realign the road.
The land reclamation by Pacific International Inc. at the lagoon side of the approach to the airport dovetails with the work that was launched two months ago in what used to be a section of the parking lot to create the new domestic terminal building.
The domestic terminal will initially be THE airport terminal, allowing for the current terminal to be demolished.
The United States is providing funding for the domestic terminal that PII is laying the groundwork for. Japan has committed to funding the new international terminal once the current terminal is demolished.
“The proposed domestic airport has a timeline of 12-16 months to complete, including the land reclamation/airport parking/road realignment,” Marshall Islands Ports Authority Director Thomas Maddison told the Journal.
The “maan airport” park — at the Laura end of the runway — has seen all of its large shade trees chopped down in the past month. It’s to meet a requirement of US Federal Aviation Administration rules banning anything tall near an airport runway.
The park, very possibly, will be eliminated in the coming years as part of continuing development and improvement of the airport area.
Maddison explained that in the longer term, the airport expects to expand with “additional land reclamation and potentially to extend the main runway length.”
A new study of the airport is looming in the near future.
“A new Airport Master Plan Study (to be funded by the US Trade and Development Agency), will include feasibility studies for more land reclamation works on the lagoonside of the runway/terminal areas, and to push out the existing airport roadway,” Maddison said.
A valuable benefit of ongoing land reclamation is protection from ongoing sea level rise and ocean inundations.
“Pushing out the existing roadways will protect the main runway and terminal infrastructures and facilities from high or king tides events.”