I had a couple of interesting conversations regarding the proposed airport expansion recently.
As you may recall, Airport Manager David Beall and his board have proposed extending the east/west runway airport to 7,000 feet. Some of the larger companies in town are making longer flights that require more fuel, more weight and more runway - especially in bad weather. (It is worth mentioning there are more jet aircraft housed at the Warsaw airport than there are at the Fort Wayne airport.)
But the extension would necessitate the closing of CR 100E. The current runway is 6,000 feet long, but you can't use all of it during landings because it's within a couple hundred feet of the road in question, and because of the 150-foot-tall high-tension power lines east of the airport.
So here's the deal. The FAA will pay for 98 percent of the expansion if it's done as outlined in the proposal - close CR 100E, lower the power lines, extend the runway. That would cost a cool $6 million. To pull it off, the city would need to buy some more land out there - it already owns land east of CR 100E - and then annex it all into the city.
At that point, the city would be solely responsible for vacating the road - by a vote of the city council, to allow the extension of the runway.
My first interesting conversation occurred last week when Biomet co-founder Dane Miller gave me a call to share his opinion on the airport expansion.
"I am 100 percent in favor of it," he said.
Miller noted he was not speaking on behalf of Biomet. He was speaking only for himself, offering a personal opinion.
"I think we have forgotten when runway 927 (east/west) was put in. We had to drive a mile out of our way to drive to the terminal," he said.
He said. for a lot of aircraft, the existing runway is "fairly marginal. With a wet runway, you can't land because of the displaced threshold. It's an issue of safety. We've already had one plane slide off the end of the runway.
"For safety reasons, I think it's an appropriate and logical thing to do. It's best for safety. It's best for human life. It's best for the airport. It's an absolute no-brainer," Miller said.
"Certainly, it creates an inconvenience, but people will learn to live with it. Two months after 100 East is closed, people won't even think about it anymore."
He's disappointed to see people arguing against the plan and said, "it would be a shame to put it off."
Nonetheless, lots of county residents are indeed arguing against it.
And despite the fact that it's largely a city issue, many are tossing darts at the county commissioners.
The public has latched onto the notion that the commissioners are pushing the expansion and that it is already a done deal. Both those suppositions are false and have never been part of our reporting.
So my second interesting airport conversation occurred Thursday when county commissioners Brad Jackson and Ron Truex stopped by the newsroom.
They said their role has been limited, except attending a meeting with the Federal Aviation Administration in Chicago and talking to engineers.
They're a little frustrated that they've been taking it on the chin on our letters page for the past couple of weeks and felt compelled to set the record straight.
"We haven't been asked to make any decision and we haven't made any decision regarding the closing of CR 100E or the airport expansion," Jackson said.
"I'm probably one of the last people in the world who wants that road closed," he added.
"There's a lot of misinformation out there," Truex said. "Fact is, we support most of the letters to the editor. We have most of the same questions they (letter writers) do."
Truex said that at the meeting with FAA officials, a lot of options were discussed - a tunnel, lowering the road below grade, shortening the north/south runway or routing the road around the existing runway so all 6,000 feet could be used.
It's been implied that it's an all-or-nothing deal with the FAA. If the road isn't closed and the runway extended, the FAA won't fund the project.
So if it was decided to reroute the road and leave the runway as is, for example, local entities would have to bear the cost.
To that, Truex says, "We could look at getting funds elsewhere."
He added, "We want to exhaust every other option before closing that road. If the people we represent have issues with this, we'll stand behind them."
Jackson said because he and Truex are pilots, there is a misconception that they are pushing the expansion.
He said the planes they fly are small. There is more than enough runway for their needs under any conditions.
"It's amazing sometimes how misinformed people can be. It's frustrating," Jackson said. "They're saying our minds are made up. We haven't been asked one single official question or made one decision."
Both commissioners said as far as they're concerned, all options are on the table. They stressed there is nothing before the county plan commission and nothing for them to look at.They say the idea that the expansion is somehow a "done deal" is absurd.
Truex said traffic counts are being done by the Michiana Area Council of Governments at the behest of the city. The county has nothing to do with it.
REMC crews recently were working on power lines near the airport. This prompted some people to think that the expansion project already had begun. But that was routine maintenance had nothing to do with the runway extension, Truex said. Besides, he said, the high-tension lines that are part of the project are owned by American Electric Power, not REMC.
"We're not the enemy," he said. "There's no conspiracy here."
Both commissioners also pointed out there is a good chance the land will be annexed into the city and the commissioners will never have a vote one way or the other.
They hope getting this message out will assuage the concerns of readers.
