An 11 million Euro project to strengthen Italy's commercial role in the aerospace sector. This is the aim of the reorganization project of the Italian "Marcello Arlotta" airport of Taranto-Grottaglie, one of the main spaceports in Europe, as emerges from the management of the management company Aeroporti di Puglia (AdP).

"Italy has undertaken a journey to develop an autonomous capacity to access space and Puglia has not been found unprepared. Giving a new face to Grottaglie airport means not only making it more beautiful, but also and above all preparing it for the future that is now and the challenge of space", explained the president of Aeroporti di Puglia, Antonio Maria Vasile.

"The competitiveness of the infrastructure derives from institutional cooperation between the Government and the Puglia Region, which will allow the Grottaglie spaceport to apply to be the first 'horizontal' spaceport in the near future, capable of taking off and landing aircraft on the continental territory of the European Union".

"However, such ambitious programs can grow and be realized in a context of pacification: for this reason I hope -concluded Vasile- that once and for all, the phase of conflict which, unfortunately, has marked relations with the territory can be overcome, the associations and committees which, despite being the expression of legitimate social claims and growth of a territory forgotten for years, end up losing sight of the possibility of economic and employment development which can make Grottaglie, Puglia, a reference point of global prestige". 

On the same topic, see also the article published by AVIONEWS.