Alleviating ‘challenges’
The opening comes as LVIA is seeing its annual summer travel surge. More than 84,000 passengers passed through the airport in June and airlines are expanding routes. Allegiant recently started service to Denver and will soon begin flights to Melbourne, Florida.
“This $35 million infrastructure investment alleviates a number of operational challenges, but also elevates the customer experience for all of our passengers aboard Allegiant, American Delta and United,” said Tom Stoudt, executive director at Lehigh-Northampton Airport Authority.
Shapiro said completing the project was a good example of simply “getting stuff done.”
“Federal, state, and local officials worked together to get this done – and I’m proud to be here on behalf of the commonwealth of Pennsylvania to celebrate the opening of this new terminal and TSA checkpoint here at the Lehigh Valley International Airport,” Shapiro said. “This expansion should send a clear message that Allentown and the Lehigh Valley are ready to drive innovation and economic opportunity on a national and global scale.”
Wild, who helped secure federal funding for the project, said it’s a needed investment for the Lehigh Valley, which has been seeing steady population growth as industries have moved in.
“I often make the distinction when I am talking to folks about federal spending,” she said. “There’s a difference between frivolous spending and investment. When you buy a new heating system for its energy efficiency or new windows in your home, that’s an investment. Buying a hot tub for the backyard is frivolous.
“This is an investment in our community and an investment in our country. What we’re going to be able to do by expanding ABE’s TSA screening capabilities and overall capacity, is grow transportation across Allentown, Bethlehem, Easton and beyond, which is going to pay dividends for our status as a continually growing economic hub on the Eastern Seaboard.”
Completing the LVIA project, Buttigieg said, is just the beginning of several airport and other transportation projects coming to fruition across the country. He said he’s seeing them developing in places as diverse as Orlando, Florida and Cedar Rapids, Iowa.
“It’s also a very special project for me, because we have now announced about 37,000 projects that are benefiting from funding in the infrastructure law,” he said. “Some of them have gotten as far as getting the funding agreement through and having money with a smaller number of them that have already had dirt fly.
“But this is the very first one that I’ve been able to be at where we are celebrating the completion of a project that was supported partly through those dollars and now we’re going to see more and more where this came from by flying to construction sites across the country.”