Trebinje ahead of schedule

Trebinje

As reported earlier, Trebinje is set to become Bosnia and Herzegovina’s fifth international airport. Previously, it was reported the airport would be operational by 2011 however, now, the Prime Minister of the entity of Republika Srpska, Milorad Dodik, believes aircraft will be arriving and departing from Trebinje by the end of 2010.

Dodik says that if a concessionaire is not found, the government of the Republic of Srpska would finance the airport’s construction out of its own funds. He says that 2 feasibility studies have been carried out and both show that an airport in this area, despite its close proximity to Tivat and Dubrovnik, would be a success. The Prime Minister also says that construction should begin in April of 2010 and that the first phase of the project should be completed by December that same year. The first phase of the project will cost approximately 30 million Euros.

The airport’s CEO, Zoran Okilj says that Trebinje would have intense traffic 10 months per year. “We are looking to attract tourists from Eastern Europe, Serbia and business passengers at first”, he says. He also states that the entire project will take 3 years to be complete and that the airport will have 400 employees.

The airport’s CEO says that despite the likes of Dubrovnik and Tivat being so close, Trebinje will have passengers because, “Unlike Dubrovnik we don’t have strong winds coming from the sea and our airspace is not as busy. Tivat on the other hand can not expand due to its geographical location. Also, we do not have snow and the climate is perfect”, Okilj says.