The jostling terminals of the Indira Gandhi International (IGI) airport, the world’s 12th busiest hub, will soon breathe a sigh of relief as the Delhi International Airport Pvt Ltd (DIAL) has finalized the route for an “air train” connecting the terminals, Aerocity and the hotel centre.

The plan for financing the automated people mover (APM) as it will be called, at the cost of Rs 2,000-2,500 crore, is currently being worked by the airline operator.

The train will have four stations, including one at the cargo terminal, which are also expected to provide connectivity with the surrounding Metro lines, The Times of India reported.

Without revealing the final date of the project completion, DIAL has said that it is likely to be finished within a timeline of three to four years, in an attempt to match it with the ongoing phase-wise expansion projects of IGIA.

DIAL says the expansion of T1 and T3, along with the fourth runway and elevated taxi track, will be complete by mid-2022 and that the T2 is expected to be demolished in 2024 in place of which, terminal T4 would be built in two phases by 2028, the report said.

The 5.1km-long air train will be underground between T1 and Aerocity and the route alignment for it has been finalised. From there to T3, the train will be mostly elevated. It will have four stations — T1, Aerocity, cargo terminal and a common terminal for T1 and T2/4.

The project was originally supposed to be completed in 2020 but suffered a delay, which the operator explained was on account of working out the most passenger friendly and the safest APM plan. “Since we have involved global leading companies from Europe and Japan evaluating different technologies is taking some time. Further, the capital investment is significant. Hence, we are exploring various models for developing the APM, including low cost financing,” TOI quoted a spokesperson from DIAL as saying.

Despite severe infrastructure constraints at the moment, IGIA was the world’s 12th busiest airport last year when it handled just under 7 crore flyers.