Saudi Arabia’s General Authority for Civil Aviation (Gaca) is preparing tender documents for the redesign of the Qurayyat domestic airport.

The scope of work includes the design of a new passenger terminal, runway, aprons, control tower, maintenance buildings, VIP lounge and landscaping. The tender is expected to be floated in about a month.

The proposed project is one of several new airport construction and expansion schemes that have been launched in the country over the past year.

Gaca is currently seeking bidders for two contracts to redesign seven domestic airports in the country.

The scope of work includes the design of new runways, aprons, control towers, maintenance buildings, VIP lounges and landscaping.

The redesign of the seven airports has been split into two separate tenders. The first tender is for design work at Al-Ahsa, Al-Wajh, Sharurah and Wadi al-Dawasir airports. Bids for the tender must be submitted by 30 April.

The second tender is for the redesign of Qaisumah, Rafha and Turaif airports. Bids for this tender must be submitted by 4 May.

In February, Gaca floated new tenders for the expansion of two domestic airports in the country.

The first tender is for the expansion of Qassim airport, which will involve the construction of a new terminal building along with other airport infrastructure such as a control tower, car parks and a mosque. The deadline for bids is 27 March.

The second tender is for the expansion of Al-Jouf airport, which will also entail construction of a new terminal and related airport infrastructure. The deadline for bids is 25 March.

Also in February, the local Al-Jaber submitted a low bid of SR1.8bn ($480m) for the contract to build the new Abha airport. Al-Jaber’s price is about 5 per cent lower than the second-lowest price of SR1.9bn submitted by the local Almabani General Contractors. The third-lowest bidder is Kuwait First Group, with a price of SR2bn.

The new terminal will cover a total area of 80,000 square metres and will have 21 passenger gates. In addition to the terminal building, the work will involve building other airport infrastructure including a control tower, car parks and facilities such as mosques.

In June 2013, Gaca received bids from 17 groups for the deal to build the new King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz airport in Jizan. The scheme will involve building a three-storey passenger terminal, control tower, air cargo zones and other facilities. The terminal will have 10 gates and a VIP lounge.

A local consortium of Saudi Lebanese Modern Construction Company (Salmoc), Safari and Al-Subaie submitted the low bid of SR2.6bn. This was 7 per cent less than the SR2.8bn price submitted by the second-lowest bidder, the local Saudi Pan Kingdom Company (Sapac).

A much larger project is King Khalid International airport. In 2013, Gaca invited nine contracting groups to bid for the contract to expand the existing Terminals 3 and 4 at the airport in Riyadh.

In February 2013, the local arm of the US-based Aecom, Aecom Arabia, was appointed to project manage the expansion scheme. The work aims to increase the airport’s annual capacity to 24 million passengers from the current 14 million.