The airports of the Riviera de Nayarit and Puerto Escondido received investments for more than 4 billion pesos, reported Javier García Bejos, CEO of Aeropuertos Mexicanos (AME); in addition, the airport of Saltillo, Coahuila, is incorporated into the Mexican Tourist Airport Group (GATM)
The director explained that the GATM arose from the association between Aeropuertos y Servicios Auxiliares (ASA) and AME, where “an opportunity was found to make strategic investments without putting the Government into debt.”
In addition, he said, this association does not generate public debt and a concession was not given to rehabilitate the infrastructure of these airports on the air-land side and thus turn them into international airports.
In an interview with A21, the director stated that, thanks to the work carried out, these airports have become a benchmark for good service. He stressed that this model opens new opportunities for the participation of the private sector in airports that were previously managed by the Government.
Under this concept of not generating debt and balancing relations without concessions, each one does what it knows how to do: ASA with its experience of more than 60 years and AME with the design of infrastructure, construction and in the promotion and detonation of destinations, both are satisfied with the work done in the airports.
“We have finished the renovation of runways, taxiways, commercial aviation platforms, general aviation, roads; with investments of more than 4 billion pesos in these airports and what is coming, which are the two new terminal buildings in each of the stations.
“So it has been a very important task of much collaboration, much teamwork, where the public and private sectors come together to seek to generate connectivity in these airports,” said García Bejos.
He added that the market is complex, but they are participating and looking at the service provision contract model, which allows them, without being concessionaires or owners of an airport, to invest in solving infrastructures, generate, through the business model, added value and find that beyond the TUA’s, airport business can be done.
“So we would be looking to participate with our model in other airports,” he said.
Saltillo joins the GATM
In this regard, Carlos Torres, a specialist in aviation issues, said that the Saltillo Airport will be part of the GATM.
“The Saltillo Airport has not had commercial flights for some time and it had a lot to do with the lack of modernization and infrastructure of the airport itself,” he said.
The specialist explained that, with the mixed investment mechanism that ASA began to do with the Airports division of Mota-Engil, they put the Nayarit and Puerto Escondido Airports on the radar and now they are going to add the Saltillo Airport, with the objective of returning commercial flights in the following months.
Torres commented that the Saltillo Airport had been “depredated” by the Monterrey International Airport. The Coahuila air terminal, like many others, began to fall behind in infrastructure and “was not very sexy” for airlines to fly there.
And now the idea is that, in addition to modernizing it as they did with the other two airports, they do the same with Saltillo with the support of AME and Mota-Engil Mexico so that in addition to the infrastructure, they help with the commercialization of the airport.
So far the amount of the investment is not known, but it will be announced soon, he said.
It should be noted that the Mexican Tourist Airport Group is partnered by ASA on the public side and by Aeropuertos Mexicanos on the private side.
Source: a21
