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WYDOT invests $34M in basin airports
By Carole Cloudwalker
This document was published online on Thursday, February 14, 2008
Big Horn Basin airport construction projects totalling almost $34 million are expected to be completed by 2012.
While some of the work might be considered routine by state and federal aviation officials, other projects - such as the new $12.5 million terminal planned for Cody and $9 million in runway work at Greybull - are aimed at improving both aviation services and the area's economic outlook.
“Aviation is an economic tool,” said Christy Yaffa of Cheyenne, airport planning and budget manager for the Wyoming Department of Transportation's Aeronautics Division. She provided information about upcoming or ongoing construction projects.
“It's surprising to me how much business depends on aviation,” Yaffa added.
And the impact of aviation on the entire state is so large that neither her department nor the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) hesitates to encourage its development, even when the country faces the threat of recession and comme rcial airlines are faltering financially and contemplating mergers so they can just keep flying.
“We (WYDOT) invest money in airports (in the Big Horn Basin) all the time. It just happens that we have several large projects going on right now,” Yaffa said.
WYDOT Aeronautics is participating, to some degree, in all the projects in the basin that comprise the $33 million, Yaffa said. If new runway work at the commercial airport in Worland is added, the total comes to about $49 million, Yaffa added.
Projects include the following:
€$12.5 million for a new terminal at Cody's commercial Yellowstone Regional Airport.
€$1.2 million in airport pavement and lighting projects at the noncommercial airfield in Cowley.
€At least $9 million in development of the non-commercial South Big Horn County Airport at Greybull.
€Almost $238,000 in recent work at the noncommercial Powell Airport, including new hangars, runway seal coat and markings, and a new Master Plan.
€About $11 million to completely relocate the noncommercial airport in Thermopolis.
“In 2008 we expect to receive about $27 million (in federal funds) for the state for capital construction at airports,” Yaffa said.
Many of the state's airfields are noncommercial, which means they do not handle commercial airline traffic, but serve general aviation - the flying public arriving in private or chartered craft - exclusively.
“The general aviation airports economically contribute quite a bit to the state,” Yaffa said.
They add jobs (80 new skilled jobs are anticipated when the Greybull aircraft repair facility owned by B&G is operational, for example) and draw money into communities through the “multiplier effect” in terms of groceries, housing and goods and services purchased by workers.
In addition, the capability to have air freight deliveries provided by companies such as Federal Express and services such as Flight for Life all benefit small towns, Yaffa added.
“Obviously, commercial providers have a huge impact, but smaller airports have a contribution as well,” she said.
“We (WYDOT Aeronautics) are providing a safe place for this to happen.”
Arguably the most dramatic changes in Big Horn Basin aviation are coming in Greybull, where a new hangar that will totally contain aircraft the size of 747s is being built this winter.
Rick Patton, a principal of GDA Engineers in Cody who has worked on the design of the new Greybull airport runway, praised B&G Industries, the company that bought much of the equiment formerly owned by Hawkins and Powers Aviation, first for purchasing their equipment and then expanding their business vision to encompass an expanded airport that could handle heavy aircraft.
“B&G is marketing Greybull, the airport and the new runway as the perfect place to have maintenance done on aircraft,” Patton said.
“A large factor in the success of B&G is the base of qualified aircraft maintenance personnel who called Greybull home,” Patton added.
He agreed with Yaffa about the economic impact of airports on communities.
“There are intrinsic benefits for a community from having an airport,” he said.
“An airport is an economic engine ... airports generate and sustain economic activity.”
He said payroll from businesses such as the airlines are easily attributable to a community having an airport, but other businesses, such as an oil parts company that flies in needed equipment, often use the airport without the consumer realizing the delivery method.
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