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The new airport terminal in Naujaat comes in at an impressive 3,500 square feet, said Darrin Nichol, director of Nunavut Airports Division.

Nichol said the new terminal is a beautiful well-lit building with lots of display area for the amazing art that comes out of Naujaat.

The new terminal is a lot more spacious, with a lot more seating, he added.

鈥淚t's better for processing passengers, both arriving and departing,鈥� said Nichol.

鈥淚t's a much more user-friendly building that's built on grades, so it's very accessible for everybody whether you have a disability or not.

鈥淚t's great. And it also has powered redundancy built in, so it has a back-up system. In the event of a power failure, it will activate and keep the lights on in the airfield to minimize any interruptions.

鈥淚t's a huge feature.鈥�

Nichol said Naujaat is unique in that it has a lot of bedrock in the area, but, overall, it was a straightforward build that went very well over the past 24 months.

鈥淚 was just up there a couple of months ago and it's fantastic," he said.

鈥淪tarting with the airline, we're hoping that in mid-May we've started processing passengers out of that building.鈥�

Nichol said the terminal came in on time and on budget, sporting a price tag of $15 million.

Studying runway extension

The proposed expansion of the runway in Naujaat is a completely different issue, Nichol stated.

鈥淲e just met with them on that and the short runway does pose challenges. I think, right now, the Nunavut Airports Division has to take some past studies and bring some information up to date because there's been different reports and assessments done.

鈥淲e're committed to getting that sorted out and getting an updated assessment for 2025 in dollars and terms and, kind of, reviewing that. There's lots of priorities, so it still has a ways to go.

鈥淲e understand the challenges that the short runway brings about and it's always one of those we're circling around. 鈥�

The community is looking to have the runway extended from its current 3,600 feet to 4,000 feet.

Nichol said that's one option, but there's numerous considerations.

He said, however, that getting the runway to 4,000 feet would be the minimal expectation.

鈥淚t's not just the community. It's the airline. It's the carriers that use the runway.

鈥淥ne thing about the Naujaat runway is that it's absolutely beautiful. It's one of the best maintained runways we have in the territory.

鈥淚'm always impressed with the way the crew there and the airport maintenance team take care of that operation because it's beautiful."

He said a short runway limits the amount of traffic in cargo, freight and people that can be brought into the community, but introducing jet service is not the primary objective. 

鈥淚t also poses service challenges and it can result in additional diversions and/or cancellations. So, it's not about extending the runway to allow jet service. That's not what this is about.

鈥淚t's about assessing what they have now and deciding which way to go forward to allow for a more convenient and more efficient [air]strip to enhance service offerings that would be brought about by the extension.鈥�