The Minister of Infrastructure Belinda Balluku signed today the contract for the construction of the Airport of Vlora with the winning consortium “Mabco Construction”, part of which is Behxhet Pacolli’s Mabetex Group, which owns 50% of the shares of the consortium, YDA Group and A2 LLC. The works are expected to start within 14 months, and the value of the construction will be 104 million euros. Vlora Airport will enable transoceanic flights, since the runway will be over 3 kilometres, and an Academy of Civil Aviation will also be established in the city. The airport according to both Prime Minister Rama and the Minister of Infrastructure Balluku is expected to give a boost to tourism, especially in southern Albania.
“With the establishment of Vlora Airport, there will be opportunities for very large investments in the tourism sector […] The Airport will be set up according to the European criteria, there will be an archaeological study, then 8 months will be available for fulfilling the preliminary conditions and submitting the master plan and 6 months for obtaining the construction permits,” declared the Minister. During today’s conference, Balluku added also that the first phase of the project includes the construction of the terminal and the start of the operations, while the second phase will consist on the expansion of the passenger terminal, which will be realized after the 4th year of operations.
