The International Airport in Jinan, capital of east China's Shandong Province, will take on a new look when an expansion project is completed at the end of the year.

The expansion project, at cost of 1.624 billion yuan (US$196 million), started in late 2002.

The project includes an 80,000-sq-m terminal building with 13 boarding gates and an annual handling capacity of 8 million passengers, 230,000-sq-m parking aprons capable of accommodating 40 planes and a navigation building and tower.

The current terminal building is far away from meeting growing traffic demand as it was designed to handle 800,000 passengers a year.

When the new terminal goes into operation, the outdated one will be transformed for cargo use.

Some 30 kilometers away from downtown Jinan, the airport, which went into operation in 1992, now operates 52 domestic and four overseas flights.

Passenger flow at the airport hit 1.74 million in 2003, and the figure is expected to rise to 2 million this year, with the volume of cargo rising from 32,000 tons to 38,000 tons during the same period.

During the first quarter of the year, the airport reported a net profit of more than 7 million yuan (US$843,000), the first profit recorded by the airport in 12 years.

The transfer of airport administration rights from the central government to locals and the high rise in local air traffic volume helped the airport make profits for the first time, airport sources said.

The airport is expected to earn about 20 million yuan (US$2.4 million) in profits this year.

(Xinhua News Agency April 29, 2004)