Istanbul another step closer to becoming 'the largest aviation hub'

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said the third airport in Istanbul will be a milestone for Turkey's civil aviation industry as the world's largest airport.

“The airport, to be the biggest project in the Turkish Republic's history, will open the doors to a new era not only for our banking and construction sectors but also the Turkish civil aviation industry," Erdoğan said at the signing of the financial agreement for the mega airport project.

“Once the project is completed with all of its facilities and fields, Turkey, particularly Istanbul, will turn into a global center for international air traffic," he said.

The Turkish joint venture consortium of Cengiz-Kolin-Limak-Mapa-Kalyon won the tender in May 2013. The construction only began in May 2015 after the official transfer of the land. The companies are obliged to pay the government 26.142 billion euros including value added tax for a 25-year lease beginning from 2017.

Three public and three foreign-financed banks will provide 4.5 billion euros to the joint venture involving the five construction companies that will carry out the construction of what will be the world's largest airport in Istanbul.

The consortium signed an agreement with the six banks -- public Turkish banks Halkbank, Ziraat Bankası, VakıfBank and foreign-financed Turkish banks DenizBank, Garanti Bankası and Finansbank -- to provide the sum of 4.5 billion euros for the first leg of the project. The total budget of the project's first leg is about 6 billion euros.

The new airport will be constructed on a 76.5-million-square-meter forest land along the Black Sea coastline on Istanbul's European side. It is still under construction at the intersection of junction roads of Arnavutköy, Göktürk and Çatalca, north of Istanbul's European side between the Black Sea regions of Yeniköy and Akpınar.

“This zone was not chosen randomly. We have taken into consideration the ecological balance in the region," the president explained.

The thirs airport is expected to be operational by the first quarter of 2018. The project includes four construction stages. When it first becomes operational, there will be two landing fields and only one terminal. When all stages are completed, the airport will be the have an annual capacity of 150 million passengers.

“When the airport begins operations, initially an estimated 80,000 people will be recruited. The number of employees will then rise up to roughly 120,000 annually once all positions of employment are fully functional," Erdoğan said.

Speaking at the signing ceremony, Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu said all great projects, still under construction across the country, will be completed with great determination. “None of them will remain unfinished," he vowed.

Davutoğlu also said they will make Istanbul the largest transportation hub as well as a global center of attraction.“The new visionary projects will help Turkey increase its competitive force on the global scale in the upcoming era," he said.

“Turkey is longitudinally becoming an important hub for sea transportation with land and air connections," he said, adding that the North Marmara Motorway will be connected to the new airport.

The third airport in Istanbul is Turkey's biggest aviation project will cost 32.399 billion euros (including VAT) in total, with an investment cost of 10.247 billion euros, lease cost of 22.152 billion.

The total project cost is estimated to be roughly 7 billion euros, excluding financing costs. It has guaranteed 342 million passengers for 12 years.The state will have a turnover of 22.2 billion euros plus VAT without making any further expenses in 25 years.

There are serious difficulties in traffic congestions because the existing two international airports in the city are not capable of meeting the increasing flight demands. Atatürk Airport on the city's European side and Sabiha Gökçen on the Anatolian side reportedly handled over 80 million passengers in 2014.

Istanbul's Atatürk International Airport will be closed down once the new airport becomes fully operational, which is claimed to become the world's largest airport.