H

ang Nadim International Airport in Batam, Riau Islands, is being used by airlines as a hub in western Indonesia by opening flights to Kalimantan and Sulawesi.

This means aircraft are bypassing the increasingly congested Soekarno-Hatta International Airport in Cengkareng, Banten, just outside Jakarta, so passengers from Sumatra no longer need to pass through the busy airport.

Lion Air is one of the pioneering carriers opening routes from Batam to a number of destinations in Java, Kalimantan and Sumatra without going through Soekarno-Hatta.

The airline'€™s Batam manager, Mahrido, said on Friday that 23 flights connected Batam with Java, Kalimantan and Sumatra.

'€œWe'€™ve designated Hang Nadim as a transit point for Lion Air as it is impossible to rely on busy Cengkareng,'€ he said. '€œMany of our flights from Cengkareng are delayed. That'€™s why we picked Batam, which has good facilities. The runway is long and the terminal is sufficient.'€

Lion Air opened the Batam-Balikpapan flight on Dec. 6 with connections to Makassar and Manado.

The airline also operates flights connecting Batam with Bandung, Jambi, Medan, Padang, Palembang, Pangkal Pinang, Pekanbaru, Silangit, Surabaya and Yogyakarta.

'€œThe load factor of each flight could reach 90 percent so we will maintain the flights in the long term,'€ Mahrido said.

He added that in 2014, Lion Air would open flights connecting Batam with Malaysia and Sulawesi.

Flag carrier Garuda Indonesia has since April linked Batam with Bandarlampung, Medan, Padang and Pekanbaru by using the Bombardier CRJ1000 NextGen regional jet. Garuda still uses the bigger Boeing 737 for the Batam-Jakarta route.

Previously, Garuda general manager in Batam, Dewa Suastika, said the opening of flights to a number of cities in Sumatra was aimed at attracting pilgrims on umroh (minor haj) pilgrimages, who previously reached Mecca via Singapore.

'€œGaruda is working on a Batam-Jeddah route to cater to umroh pilgrims,'€ he said.

Batam Free Trade Zone Management Agency (BPK FTZ) spokesman and One-Roof Integrated Services (PTSP) director Dwi Djoko Wiwoho said the agency, which owns Hang Nadim, would upgrade a number of facilities at the airport to anticipate higher numbers of passengers.

Hang Nadim served 3.38 million passengers in 2011 and 3.76 million in 2012. In the first 10 months of 2013, there have been 4 million passengers, with capacity at 5 million. The planned upgrade would increase the capacity to 8 million passengers.

Djoko said the upgrade would include widening the taxiway and apron as well as adding one more aerobridge.