Small airport operator could halt Transnet's dig-out port plans

Transnet’s plans to build a digout port south of Durban may be jeopardised since eThekwini Municipality is considering allocating the site to an airport operator. Transnet said it had not been approached about the matter. “The old Durban International Airport site has been decommissioned as an airport. Transnet has not had discussions with anyone regarding the use of the site for aviation purposes,” Mboniso Sigonyela, spokesman for Transnet SOC, said. Transnet wants the site for its multi-billion rand dig-out port, one of two dig-out sites earmarked by Transnet to expand Durban’s port over the next 50 years to accommodate increased container traffic. The other dig-out site is at Bayhead. Now eThekwini Municipality is considering moving the Virginia Airport operators to the old airport site to accommodate overflow from King Shaka International Airport. The municipality intends to meet with Transnet to discuss possible relocation, according to a report in the Mercury newspaper. Virginia Airport operators have lived with uncertainty since the start of the year when the municipality notified them that leases would operate on a month-to-month basis. At the same time the south Durban residents have been opposing plans by the municipality to build an expanded port facility to cope with increased freight traffic from the Durban port expansion. INSERT ‘Virginia Airport operators have lived with uncertainty since the start of the year.’