Tancredo Neves/Confins International
Airport , popularly known as Confins International
Airport, is located Belo Horizonte
downtown. The name honors the memory of
former President
Tancredo
Neves.
It is currently the largest and busiest
airport in the state of Minas Gerais
. It is deemed to be one of the finest and
best equipped in
Latin America.
It used to
be under-utilized and was among Brazil
's least used
airports because Belo Horizonte also has an
airport closer to downtown, Belo Horizonte/Pampulha - Carlos Drummond de
Andrade Airport
. Since 2005 however, most of the flights to
and from Pampulha were transferred to Confins International
Airport.
In 2008, the airport handled 5,189,528 passengers and 59,544
aircraft movements, making it the
8th busiest airport
in Brazil in terms of passengers.
Its cargo facilities have a capacity of handling 18.000 tonnes
(39.682.000 lb) and the warehouse has 6.400 m² (68.889 ft²).
History
The airport was built by
Infraero in the
early 1980s at a cost of $1.2 billion in Brazilian currency. It was
inaugurated in 1984. It was built to lessen congestion at Pampulha
Airport, which was operating at 120% of its capacity of 1.3 million
passengers per year.
It was expected that by 1990, passenger movement at Confins would
be nearly 2 million passengers per year. However, it only surpassed
the 1 million passenger mark 22 years later. Its maximum
operational capacity is 5 million passengers per year.
Since its inauguration, despite plans to help lessen congestion at
urban Pampulha airport, just a fraction of the capacity of Confins
has been used. This is in part due to its distance from downtown
and, until recently, the lack of satisfactory transportation
alternatives to pricey (about $40 USD) taxi fares, leading people
to continue to use the more central but very crowded
Pampulha.
However, by March 2005 the government had transferred 130 flights
from Pampulha Airport to Tancredo Neves International Airport, thus
increasing annual passenger flow from 350,000 to around 3.0 million
in 2005. This was extremely necessary, since Pampulha had been
operating at 200% of its maximum capacity, while Confins was known
as Infraero's most inefficient and least-used airport.
The airport is used primarely as a domestic airfield, but some
international flights are operated either one-stop or nonstop out
of the airport.
TAM Brazilian Airlines offers
one-stop international service to and from Buenos Aires
, Miami
and Paris
(the last
two with a change of aircraft in Rio de Janeiro
and São Paulo
, respectively).
TAP Air Portugal started offering nonstop
service between Lisbon
and Belo Horizonte on February 11 2008. Service is five times a
week with
Airbus A330 aircraft. This
flight enables 1-connection services between Belo Horizonte and 42
European destinations through Lisbon.
In August 21 of the
same year Copa Airlines started
operations to Panama
City
using Boeing 737-700s
(also five times a week) and, in November 5, American Airlines, inaugurated four times
a week, nonstop operations to Miami with Boeing 767-300 equipment.
Projects
Many recent projects have been carried out, including improvement
of the highway that links the city center to the airport (MG-10
highway) as part of a larger project called Linha Verde (Green
Line), which seeks to reduce the time needed to reach the airport.
The Green Line has been mostly completed. Another project, called
the "industrial-airport", will tax exempt industries interested in
settling their business near the airport, transforming its
surroundings.
Moreover, comfortable and frequent shuttle buses now link downtown
Belo Horizonte and the airport. Their fares range from R$6.75 for
the conventional bus to R$15.50 (about $USD 8.00 in April, 2007)
for the air-conditioned Executive Shuttle. Tickets are available at
booths in the arrivals area.
Infraero has plans to increase the number of check-in positions at
the airport from 33 to 43 soon and ultimately have 60 check-in
positions. There is a project to extend the runway from 3000m to
3660m. At 3000m the current runway may require a weight restriction
in take-offs of very long flights. Infraero has further expansion
studies with the removal of the current passenger pick-up and
drop-off lanes. That space would be used for an enlarged lobby. A
new outer lane would be built in part of the current parking lot
and parking spaces would be stacked on a three-deck garage. A
remote parking lot is currently under construction.
Transportation
It is regularly served by buses, taxis and shuttles. Transfer at
Belo Horizonte's subway, when using buses, is possible.
Airlines and destinations
See also
References
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