Edinburgh runway upgrade complete

In April, work began at Edinburgh airport to upgrade its main runway, at a projected cost of £16m. The work was due to be completed at the end of this month, but has already been finished, and the runway is operational once again.

Typically, the runway handles 115,000 flights per year. Work was carried out at night time, with flights using the airport’s second runway during that time.

The use of the secondary runway at night time resulted in noise created over areas not normally troubled by aircraft noise, such as south and west Edinburgh, Midlothian and West Lothian.

The eight months of work involved the laying of 25,000 tonnes of asphalt as well the replacement of 1,000 runway lights. It is anticipated that the work will extend the runway’s life for an additional 15 years. The last resurfacing was completed in 1991.

Gordon Dewar, the airport’s managing director, said: “This has been a complex and challenging project, involving a number of organisations and many hundreds of airport workers. I am delighted that, working together, we have completed the resurfacing work on time, and on budget.”

Dewar expressed his gratitude to the residents of the area who had been affected during the past eight months, for their “patience and goodwill.”

He noted: “We have made every effort to minimise disruption to local communities by completing this project as quickly as possible and keeping affected people informed about the progress of the works.”

Thanks to news.bbc.co.uk for the above quotes, for more information on this article please visit their website.

www.edinburghairport.com