Steph​on Nicholas

To­ba­go Cor­re­spon­dent

The new ter­mi­nal at the ANR Robin­son In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port in To­ba­go is ex­pect­ed to open be­fore Oc­to­ber.

Speak­ing to the me­dia on Wednes­day, To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly (THA) Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine as­sured the pub­lic that the new fa­cil­i­ty will be ready to ac­com­mo­date the in­flux of vis­i­tors ex­pect­ed for the is­land’s an­nu­al Car­ni­val cel­e­bra­tions, sched­uled for Oc­to­ber 30 to No­vem­ber 1.

Asked for an up­date on the air­port, Au­gus­tine ini­tial­ly sug­gest­ed the ter­mi­nal could open by Sep­tem­ber, but lat­er re­vised the time­line.

“In fact, I say it will hap­pen with­in the space of a month from to­day. Cer­tain­ly, it will hap­pen be­fore we get to Oc­to­ber when we ex­pect huge num­bers com­ing to the is­land,” he said.

Au­gus­tine said the ter­mi­nal’s build-out has en­tered its sec­ond phase, but the on­go­ing works will not af­fect the open­ing date.

“We have com­plet­ed the first phase of works on the in­side of the ter­mi­nal and we are start­ing the sec­ond phase. Those works can ac­tu­al­ly hap­pen while the ter­mi­nal is op­er­a­tional, so I be­lieve we have every­thing we need now to go op­er­a­tional,” he said.

He added that To­bag­o­ni­ans would be proud of the new fa­cil­i­ty, which is ex­pect­ed to show­case the is­land’s cul­ture and his­to­ry.

The works are be­ing man­aged by the THA in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Air­ports Au­thor­i­ty of Trinidad and To­ba­go. The Di­vi­sion of Fi­nance, Trade and the Econ­o­my has al­lo­cat­ed $10 mil­lion for the ter­mi­nal’s build-out.

Au­gus­tine said a few ad­min­is­tra­tive pro­ce­dures must still be com­plet­ed to fa­cil­i­tate op­er­a­tions in­volv­ing the Cus­toms and Ex­cise Di­vi­sion.

“I know Cus­toms must place in the Gazette that this ter­mi­nal is go­ing to be used. That will al­low for things like du­ty-free ac­cess and op­er­a­tions Cus­toms has by law, and oth­er teething is­sues,” he said.

Au­gus­tine said the THA is await­ing a di­rec­tive from Cab­i­net for the of­fi­cial open­ing. He re­it­er­at­ed that a flight sim­u­la­tion and com­mis­sion­ing cer­e­mo­ny will be held about one week be­fore the ter­mi­nal be­comes ful­ly op­er­a­tional.

In an ex­clu­sive in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia in March, Au­gus­tine had hint­ed at a grand open­ing of the air­port to co­in­cide with the Oc­to­ber car­ni­val. He said sev­er­al stake­hold­ers were push­ing for the open­ing to co­in­cide with the fes­ti­val.

On Ju­ly 20, while speak­ing in Char­lot­teville, Au­gus­tine teased a date for the air­port’s com­mis­sion­ing, say­ing the flight sim­u­la­tion would take place “with­in the week or by next week­end.”

He said, “An an­nounce­ment will come out this week. Per­haps by to­mor­row you will have an an­nounce­ment for the com­mis­sion­ing. There will be a com­mis­sion­ing and a flight sim­u­la­tion. Once that is done, the Min­istry of Civ­il Avi­a­tion will make a pub­lic an­nounce­ment for the ac­tu­al of­fi­cial use of the air­port.”