The arrival of winter weather means grading and drainage work at the New Castle-Henry County Municipal Airport is done for the year.
Crews from Boyd & Company Construction have been busy at the airport, located on County Road 400 South east of Ind. 103, since Oct. 19. They are preparing the area for the construction of a new runway, an idea that has been discussed for several years.
John Baer, a consultant with the engineering firm Woolpert who has been working with the local Board of Aviation Commissioners on this project since its inception, told the board Monday that the grading and drainage work on the western half of the project area is 60 to 70 percent complete.
He suggested the board approve a request to winterize the site and cease operations until more favorable weather returns and the board voted unanimously to do so.
Board members expressed concern that the original scope of the project has been scaled back. The new runway was originally designed to be 5,000 feet long by 75 feet wide in order to accommodate small jets and large propeller-powered aircraft, which would facilitate economic development efforts. At present, the design is for a runway 4,201 feet long by 60 feet wide.
“The project has actually always called for two phases and the first phase has always been to construct the new runway at 4,200 by 60 feet and the second phase, which I’ll call the ultimate phase, is for 5,000 by 75 feet,” Baer said. “In order to get to the 5,000 by 75 feet the FAA has said we have to provide justification to get there.”
Baer said he and the board are hopeful once actual construction of the runway begins it can be built at the larger size in order to save time and money.
Baer is asking that members of the Henry County industrial and business community who would benefit from the larger runway provide the board with letters stating as much, which could then be shared with the FAA.
“As part of the justification for the larger runway we need a certain number of operations from the types of aircraft that require that longer length and width and right now we don’t have it, but a lot of corporations, Boar’s Head for example, have corporate aircraft with those requirements and we’re trying to reach out to them to prove that we’re going to have at least 500 operations from those larger aircraft each year,” Baer said. “Until we can show that we have the potential for those 500 operations we can’t justify the additional length and width.”
The board also approved a $320,366.94 payment associated with the improvement project. Of the total, $288,330 is coming from funds provided by the FAA and $16,018.35 is from funds provided by the Indiana Department of Transportation.
Overall, Baer said he is pleased with the progress being made at the airport and said he is hopeful at least some of the new runway will be constructed as early as the summer of 2016.
