Ruzyne International Airport
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Template:Titlelacksdiacritics Template:Airport frame Template:Airport title Template:Airport image Template:Airport infobox Template:Runway title Template:Runway Template:Runway Template:Runway Template:Airport end frame Ruzyně International Airport serves Prague, Czech Republic. Located 10km from the city centre, the airport is a hub for ČSA Czech Airlines.
Most flights leave Ruzyně International Airport from the North Terminal. The South Terminals, South and South2, handle a few irregular flights, as well as VIP Flights, special flights and small aircraft.
The airport contains two runways in service: 06/24 and 13/31. Former runway 04/22 is not used anymore. The most used runway is 24 due to the prevailing western winds. Runway 31 is also used often. Runway 06 is used rarely while runway 13 is used only exceptionally.
Public transport to and from Prague city center involves taking the express bus service (number 119 (http://www.dpp.cz/idos/ZJRRes.asp?tt=e&cl=E5&from=0&from=1955&to=0&to=582&ln=0&ln=16632)) to Dejvická metro station and transferring on to the green metro line (Line A) there. A typical journey takes about 40 minutes. There are also other bus services that run after midnight when the metro line is not in operation.
Further development
As the capacity of the airport has been reaching its limit for the last couple of years (as of 2005), further development of the airport is being considered. Besides regular repairs of the existing runways, the Czech Airports Authority (CAA, Czech: Česká správa letišť) began the preparations for building a new runway, parallel to the 06/24 runway. The construction with estimated costs of CZK 5-7 thousand million is scheduled to begin in 2007 and the new runway marked 06R/24L (also called the BIS runway) is to be put into service in 2010. It will be over 3500 m long and will lay about 1500 m south-east of the present main runway. The 24L runway will be equipped with a category III ILS allowing landing and taking off even under very aggravated conditions.
The CAA states that besides increasing the airport capacity, the new runway system will greatly reduce the noise level in some densely inhabited areas of Prague. This should be achieved by reorganizing the air traffic space around the airport and shifting the traffic corridors after putting the two parallel runways into service. However, the vision of heavier traffic raised many protests from the suburban communities directly surrounding the airport. On 6 November 2004, local referenda were held in two Prague suburbs - Nebušice and Přední Kopanina - giving official support to the local authorities for active opposition against the construction of the parallel runway.
External links
- Ruzyne International Airport Homepage (http://www.csl.cz/en/letiste/ruzyne/)