China's capital city plans to build a new airport in the southern suburb of Daxing District, municipal government sources said Sunday.

The regional aviation hub is designed to handle 80 million passengers a year upon its completion in the long run.

The first phase of construction is expected to be finished within the the 12th Five-Year Plan period (2011-2015), and 40 million passengers will be handled each year.

Travel time between the airport and city downtown will be kept within half an hour, according to Beijing's 12th Five-Year Plan (2011-2015), which had been approved by the municipal legislature.

Although the new airport's location is not disclosed in the Five-Year Plan, the government of Daxing District has included airport construction in its development plan in the next five years.

Seeing rapidly growing air traffic in recent years, Beijing aims to handle 120 million passengers through its airports in 2015.