To help transit international passengers, the Airports Authority of India (AAI) is building eight suite rooms in the upcoming T3 International Terminal at Chennai airport.

The new integrated building (comprising T2 and T3 Terminals), extending to an area of 2,20,972 square metres at ₹2,467 crore, has been under construction. Three years back, after quite a bit of a delay, the T2 Terminal alone was completed and now handles international flight operations.

The T3 Terminal, which will be an extension of the T2 Terminal, is getting built now, and within it, AAI plans to have eight suite rooms for the transit passengers by December 2026. Officials of AAI said they have already held discussions with some of the top hotels in the city to see how this facility can be leased out. When the terminal gets completed, they will float bids to have a hotel operator maintain it.

“Several air passengers sometimes have long transit times, sometimes stretching to 10-12 hours. Hence, we thought it would be useful to have such a facility for them to rest. With the existing space available, we have planned eight rooms,” an official said.

Shankar, a frequent flyer said, cloak rooms in the airport and hotels in the vicinity are a crucial amenity for both domestic and international air passengers. “This is a welcome move at the airport. After the first leg of a flight, if there is a long transit time, many passengers are left wondering where to go and how to rest for a while. This could be very helpful for them,” he said.

Earlier, a hotel with more rooms was proposed in the initial planning stage of the T3 Terminal, but later AAI officials thought it was not feasible to build it, as there may be challenges and additional security measures needed to be in place. Besides, domestic air passengers have been seeking cloak rooms in the T1 Terminal for years now.