Funding still main topic for planned airport control tower
Funding still main topic for planned airport control tower
By John Mullen
Everything is still on track with plans to build a $4.6 million control tower at Jack Edwards Airport and, again, funding is the main topic.
“There’re two sources,” Airport Authority Manager Scott Fuller said.
“The airport improvement program which will give us 90 percent of the funding and reimburse use for 90 percent of what we’ve already spent as far as engineering. The timing on that is probably not good. If it were approved coming up in October-November it’s a possibility we can get it for next year. If not, Congress made through this FAA bill another fund called the Small Airport Fund available for control towers and that’s close to 100 percent.”
The current plan is to get the preliminaries done before Jan. 1, be ready to build next spring and open in 2021.
“The schedule right now as far as to complete the design with all the FAA comments and everything else by December of this year,” Fuller said. “Be ready for bid and bid advertise in March and complete construction next December and open up in January 2021. The funding has not been approved yet and that’s the big question mark.”
Fuller says the FAA should finalize its contract with the company that will operate the control tower by October. And, Gulf Shores is still on the fast track to get the next tower via a new approval process by the FAA.
“We’re the guinea pig,” Fuller said. “We’re on a conference call with all the FAA offices that have a say in this project from funding to airspace to flight procedures to obstruction evaluation – everybody that’s involved in it. They’re talking about how it’s working out and basically all I kept hearing throughout the entire conservation was at Jack Edwards we did this, at Jack Edwards we did that. That’s all they’re talking about.”
In addition to the new tower, the the Gulf Shores Airport Authority is making plans for a passenger terminal, allowing the airport to include scheduled service.
“I’ve been talking to the airlines for a couple of years. But the next step is to let them know when the terminal will be ready and try to get a letter of intent from them in order for us to get grant funds to help build this thing,” Fuller said.
“Initiating the design of a new control tower and commercial airline terminal is an exciting step forward,” Mayor Robert Craft said. “The continued growth of our airport is a critical factor in providing enhanced economic development opportunities for our entire community.”
Gulf Shores has spent about $1.2 million to improve roads at the airport and inside the Business and Aviation Park. City officials have their fingers crossed for a grant application that, if approved, would fund $15 million of the total $23 million estimated for the project.