- €160+ million for a 3km tunnel: Supposedly triggered by ancient discoveries at Petriakos Lakos, turning a road connection into an astronomical tunneling expedition.
- €80 million increase since November 2025: In under a year, the Infrastructure Ministry’s additional compensation estimate quietly surged from €363.9 million to €444.3 million.
- Delay compensation: Paying the concession company extra because the construction phase got dragged out.
- Lost revenue compensation: Paying the company for two full years of missed operational profits because opening day was postponed.
- COVID-19 compensation: Reimbursing shortfalls in passenger duty fees (TEAA) all the way back to 2020 and 2021.
What started life with a construction cost of €625 million has now entered a rather more ambitious financial phase.
The new Heraklion International Airport at Kastelli is now carrying €444.3 million in additional compensation payments, according to a new decision by the Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport. That is roughly €80 million more than the €363.9 million approved last November.
The original airport was simply too inexpensive.
The additional compensation relates to four main issues: extensions to the construction period, compensation for lost revenue following a 24-month postponement to the start of operations, the impact of COVID-19 measures on contractual payments, and changes in legislation that required the construction of a three-kilometre tunnel.
The tunnel is, naturally, the star of the show.
Its cost exceeds €160 million, following the discovery of archaeological remains in the Petriakos Lakos area. In other words, Crete did what Crete does best: it reminded everybody that beneath almost every ambitious construction project there may be several thousand years of history waiting to send the invoice.
To be clear, the archaeological discoveries are not the problem. Archaeology is not an inconvenience to be mocked away. The amusing part is the sheer scale of the resulting bill.
The airport’s original construction cost was €625 million. With the additional costs now officially recognised, the construction bill is approaching €1.08 billion.
That is an increase of roughly €455 million, or about 73 percent, compared with the original construction figure.
Seventy-three percent.
At this point, calling it an overrun feels almost unnecessarily judgmental. Perhaps we should call it an enhanced airport financial experience.
And the bill does not end with the tunnel.
The compensation package includes the cost of extending the construction period, compensation for the concession company because the start of operations was pushed back by two years, and compensation associated with the pandemic. The latest decision therefore formalises an increase that had already been emerging in the project’s financial history.
The airport has also required substantial spending on aviation-navigation systems. In July, the Civil Aviation Authority approved the financing process for equipment and project-management costs estimated at €112.4 million, with payments spread across 2026, 2027 and 2028.
So, yes, there is an airport under construction. And yes, the project is progressing.
But somewhere along the way, the €625 million airport quietly evolved into a project whose construction cost is approaching €1.08 billion.
And that is before we start getting sentimental about all the other things an airport needs in order to actually function.
The government has previously described Kastelli as a transformative infrastructure project for Crete, with the airport intended to dramatically expand the island’s capacity and eventually replace Heraklion’s existing airport. During a January 2026 visit, the Prime Minister’s office reported construction progress of 67 percent and referred to a 2028 operating timetable.
The latest project information puts physical progress above 75 percent, with test flights expected in 2027 and normal operations expected to follow.
So we are getting there.
Slowly.
Expensively.
And with an increasingly impressive collection of reasons why the bill needed to become considerably larger than the number originally printed on the box.
The new airport may well become one of Crete’s most important pieces of infrastructure. It may boost tourism, improve connectivity and eventually justify the enormous investment.
But for now, there is one figure that deserves to remain prominently displayed next to the construction site:
€625 million.
That was the original price.
The airport, meanwhile, appears to have discovered that it has expensive ambitions.
