In an effort to meet growing visitor demand and combat the issue of overcapacity Bali International Airport will get a US$211 million upgrade.

According to the Bali Airport Management Company Chief Director Mr Tommy Soetomo said that the company is ready to begin the first part of a four phase expansion project that will cost around US$211 million.

Construction will begin in February 2012 and so far we haven’t missed a deadline, everything remains on schedule,” Mr Soetomo said.

“The project will be divided into four phases. The first phase includes building access roads for the surrounding environment and the second phase is building a parking area.

“The third phase is building the terminal, which will start in March or April this year. The fourth phase is creating an automatic baggage handling system,” Mr Soetomo said.

The project will include constructing a new international terminal and changing the current terminal to a domestic airport. Spanning 190,000 square meters the terminal will be capable of accommodating 20 million passengers 12 months after the project is complete in 2013.

Additionally, a new transit hotel will be built as well as a three story parking station able to accommodate 1,500 cars.