The last few years have been turbulent (get it, turbulent) for the Bend Airport even though activity has dramatically increased since 2000.
Cessna closed a large facility there in 2009 and it’s been difficult to attract new businesses, in part because of a shortage of space for midsize companies at the airport, said city officials at a joint meeting with the Deschutes County Commission today.
But now the city has a new plan to improve the airport and encourage economic development there for the next 20 years.
Look down below for some of the highlights of that plan, but here’s some key background first.
The airport is located east of Bend along Powell Butte Highway. It’s on county land, but is owned by the city. Private planes, jets, helicopters and a number of aircraft related businesses are located there. The entire airport is part of the La Pine enterprise zone, meaning that businesses may be eligible for tax deals if they locate inside the zone.
Bottom line, the airport has the potential to be a bustling little economic hub and the city wants to jump start that action.
The new airport plan hasn’t been adopted, yet, but that will likely happen this winter, said city officials. After that, expect to see more discussion about how to the key airport projects listed here, according to city officials and the master plan document:
- Extend the runway to allow larger planes to land at the airport
- Build an air traffic control tower
- Build helipads and move all helicopter activity to the east side of the runway
- Build more hangars, aircraft and vehicle parking, and business sites on the east side of the runway
- Acquire property on either the north side of the airport or the south side for future expansion
- Improve the look of the airport to enhance a sense of pride in the airport
To read the master plan yourself go here.
Fun Bend Airport Facts:
- Traffic from airplanes based at the Bend Airport increased about 40 percent between 2000 and 2010
- Hangar square footage was increased by about 33 percent between 2000 and 2010
- Helicopter flight training at the airport conducted by Leading Edge Aviation increased from 700 hours to 7,000 hours between 2006 and 2010.
- Professional Air flight school increased flight training hours by 78 percent from 2009 to 2010.
Source: Bend Airport Master Plan
This article appears in Aug 30 – Sep 5, 2012.
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I recently checked the Redmond Airport website to determine status of the proposed airport closure for May 2016 and according to their website, “during the 21 day closure, all air service will be suspended from May 2-22, 2016. Air carriers will not issue RDM tickets to customers during these traveling dates…[g]iven our proactive communications with air carriers we do not anticipate customers will encounter travel problems by inadvertantly purchasing tickets during the closure date.” Obviously their information is incorrect as I was just able to reserve flights from my military overseas location in Frankfurt Germany to Redmond on United Airlines, Delta Airlines and Alaska Airlines websites for the dates of 4-21 May. As the travel community is normally able to purchase tickets a year in advance, it would be extremely helpful for the airport leadership to get with the airlines and get the travel closure information in their system to prevent inadvertent ticket purchase.
Follow-up to my last post, Zachary Bass at the Redmond Apt got back to me advised the airlines are not suspending ticket sales as they are taking “a wait-and-see approach” with possible work slippage. Obviously, the airlines are going to book the tickets and then end up with a number of upset passengers when the flights are cancelled. Wonder why management in those airlines are not willing to take the Redmond Airport staff who are doing the project management at their word. Thanks for the quick response, Zachary.