The tourist arrivals for the year 2000 were 354,087 and for 2013 were less at 345,387. All figures are taken from the published statistics on the government’s website.
The congestion at the Owen Roberts International Airport increased a few years ago when the tourist arrival numbers were much smaller than in 2000. For example, in 2006 tourist arrivals were only 267,258 (86,829 or about 30 percent less than the year 2000); in 2007 they were 291,503; and in 2010 they were 288,772.
Why in the late 1990s and 2000, when the numbers of tourist arrivals were higher than in any year from 2001 to 2013, was there far less congestion?
The answer is simple. Look back 13 years ago and earlier, before political party governments, and see how capable governments solved problems, normally without experts and without borrowing hundreds of millions of dollars which the public must now pay back. Pre-2000 governments were on a centralized cash accounting system – no cash, no spending – and always, with few exceptions, had a surplus, and the accounts and spending were centralized and controlled by the Financial Secretary.
Before the year 2000, aircraft arrivals and departures were spread over longer periods. It’s not easy but it can be done. We did it. Cayman does not have enough money to build airport facilities to take such large concentrations of arriving and departing flights. No airport can. It also takes larger numbers of staff.
During our second government term, when Jim Bodden was Minister of Aviation, we built the terminal in 1984. Future expansions are possible in a second level and also on both sides of the present building. No extension has been done in the past 30 years.
In the late 1990s, our government resurfaced and extended the Owen Roberts airport runway (with increased jet parking and turning areas for BA’s jets), and we also resurfaced the Capt. Charles Kirkconnell Airport on Cayman Brac.
A solution to the congestion is to reschedule air arrivals and thus departures further apart at peak times rather than spending $100 million on Rolls Royce–type buildings which are not economically feasible. Cayman Airways cannot pay landing and other fees from revenues, which fees are a large part of the CIAA’s income, because it now makes and always has made a loss before subsidy (subsidies are now called “payments for services”). In the 1990s the subsidy was $4 million, but now it is estimated to be $21 million for 2014/2015 for “purchases and debt servicing.”
If this government feels it must expand the terminal, then they should be able to build a suitable concrete or steel and glass building which is hurricane resistant on the southwest side of the present terminal (i.e. the open area towards the fire station) for about $1.4 million to seat about two-thirds of the outgoing passengers and add two-thirds more gates. Then turn some of the present departure terminal into areas for incoming passengers.
When we were in government, the Financial Secretary and the Minister would have done the feasibility study in-house and took the $1.4 million spent on the two private consultant studies by the present and past governments and built a new departure lounge with it. We rarely had private consultants. The Ministers are well paid and should do more of this work in government.
The present government must seek simpler and less costly solutions rather than borrowing large sums of money to add to the crippling $700 million of public debt and liabilities which political party governments borrowed in about the past six years. Total debt in the year 2000 was only $110 million – and our governments before the year 2000 built most of the infrastructure in the Cayman Islands, including the airports facilities, and mainly from profits.
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