{"id":805255,"date":"2025-01-09T14:00:54","date_gmt":"2025-01-09T12:00:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=805255"},"modified":"2025-01-09T14:00:59","modified_gmt":"2025-01-09T12:00:59","slug":"top-south-african-international-airport-lying-completely-idle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/property\/805255\/top-south-african-international-airport-lying-completely-idle\/","title":{"rendered":"Top South African international airport lying completely idle"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Durban International Airport, which served as the city\u2019s primary air travel hub for six decades, is lying completely idle and paralysed by legal and political wranglings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Louis Botha Airport, renamed Durban International Airport in 1994 following democratic elections, was opened in 1951.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The airport, situated to the south of the city, was the major hub servicing Durban and enjoyed a large volume of domestic flights.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At its peak, it was the third most popular airport in South Africa and served millions of travellers annually.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, it had a challenge. Its 2.4-kilometre runway was too short for a Boeing 747 and other large aircraft to take off, restricting its international appeal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Durban lost almost all its international flights, which means travellers landed at OR Tambo in Johannesburg or the Cape Town International Airport.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To address this problem, King Shaka International Airport took over from the Durban International Airport as the city\u2019s primary airport.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

King Shaka International Airport, located in La Mercy, approximately 35 km north of Durban, opened its doors to passengers on 1 May 2010.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is much larger than the Durban International Airport and has a 3.7-kilometre runway, which could accommodate larger aircraft.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

King Shaka International Airport boasts 34 airport bays, higher than the old airport\u2019s 24, and has 16 airport bridges, which the Durban International Airport did not have.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Where the old airport could only handle 4.4 million passengers annually, the new airport can handle 7.5 million.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The King Shaka International Airport also has more check-in counters, a wider selection of self-help kiosks, and a bigger airport terminal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It also more than doubled the retail space, from 2,900 square meters to 6,500 square meters, and increased the number of outlets from 23 to 52.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

King Shaka International Airport is better in every than the older Durban International Airport, which is why it was developed and selected as the city\u2019s primary airport.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Durban International Airport deserted<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In 2012, Transnet bought the Durban International Airport\u2019s terminal building, runways, and 800 hectares of open fields from the Airports Company South Africa (ACSA) for R1.85 billion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Transnet planned to develop the former Durban International Airport into a \u201cdig out\u201d mega container port for heavy modern cargo vessels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The state-owned enterprise said that once the project was completed, it would triple the Durban port\u2019s cargo capacity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, this project never materialised, and Transnet shifted its focus to resolve the mounting projects at the existing Durban port.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With the airport lying idle, a private company, Seaworld Aviation, unveiled an ambitious plan to revive it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Seaworld Aviation envisaged smaller airlines using it as a hub to get tourists to Durban\u2019s Southern coastline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Transnet signed a ten-year lease with Seaworld Aviation in 2017 which gave it the rights to operate the airport until 2027.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, these plans did not materialise as Transnet and Seaworld have engaged in a legal battle regarding the contract.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2022, Citizen reported<\/a> that Transnet had failed to evict the company operating from the old Durban airport after the lease was cancelled.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Transnet says it cancelled the lease in 2018 because the company utilised the premises in breach of the agreement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAs soon as the tenant took over, they started subletting it to businesses that have nothing to do with aviation,\u201d it said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a strange turn of events, the old airport building\u2019s new tenants people broke down walls, cut through buildings, and repurposed storage tanks meant for aviation fuel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In August 2024, the Special Investigating Unit (SIU) announced it was investigating allegations of serious maladministration within Transnet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This investigation included the lease agreement concerning the old Durban International Airport premises.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The premises included the runway, tarmac, apron, taxiways, old terminal building, ATNS building, security building, Maritime School, and SAA Site.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Durban International Airport, which served as the city\u2019s primary air travel hub for six decades, is lying completely idle. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":805256,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12755],"tags":[21300,19768,21301,2138],"class_list":["post-805255","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-property","tag-durban-international-airport","tag-king-shaka-international-airport","tag-louis-botha-airport","tag-transnet"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/805255","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=805255"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/805255\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":806256,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/805255\/revisions\/806256"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/805256"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=805255"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=805255"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=805255"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}