11 firms submit their offers for Rize-Artvin airport

Bids for the Rize-Artvin Airport, Turkey's second airport and the world's third to be constructed on reclaimed land, were held Wednesday at the General Directorate of Infrastructure Investments.

Eleven firms including TBM Yapı-Ermit-Pers Joint Venture, Yüksel-Mapa-Ederay, STFA-Makyol-Doğuş Joint Venture, Yapı Merkez-Mönİnşaat, Grandi Lavori Fincosit SPA-Nurol Joint Venture, IC İçtaşAstaldi-Astur Joint Venture, Cengiz İnşaat-Aga Enerji Joint Venture, China Airport-Arda-China Energy Joint Venture, Şenbay Madencilik AŞ-Limak İnşaat Joint Venture, TAV Tepe Akfen-Özaltın Joint Venture, and Stroysnabcontract LLC-Demce-Metaleks Joint Venture submitted their offers for the airport's bidding. Following the evaluation by the Bidding Committee, financial offers will be asked from the firms with technical sufficiency.

Set to be built on the Yeşilköy and Pazar coastline located 34 kilometers from Rize's city center, 105 kilometers from Trabzon and about 75 kilometers from Artvin borders, the airport will be modeled after the Ordu-Giresun Airport. The airport, which will have both domestic and international flights, will have a 3,000-meter-long and 45-meter-wide runway along with connection roads, a 265-meter-long and 24-meter-wide taxiway, and a 300-meter-long and 120-meter-wide apron. The airport will be Turkey's 56th and will serve 2 million passengers a year.

For the airport, which was modeled using Boeing 737-800 type aircraft as references, a runway running on an east-west axis in parallel with the sea will be constructed along with the connection roads on an area of 4,500 meters. Construction work will require a total of 88.5 million tons of backfilling materials, including 25 million tons of stones. An average of 17 meters deep reclaimed island will be constructed reaching down to 22 meters at the greatest depth.