Costs to cut 2-story terminal to 1 at NLR airport, panel told
Improvements and expansion at North Little Rock Municipal Airport remain a few months away after officials learned their plan would need to be adjusted again because of costs.
Airport director Clay Rogers told the Airport Commission on Thursday that the new terminal likely will need to be one floor after officials found that the cost of a two-story building would exceed the budget.
“Elevators, stairs and support beams add up in cost,” Rogers said. “We can try to keep the concept that we like but lower the cost by making it one-story.”
Rogers said the idea also includes leaving the current terminal building in place. He said the building, which is 10 years old, might be repurposed for another use.
“This will still give us the ‘wow’ factor, but the one-story will hopefully be significantly less than the two-story,” he said. “The cost estimate for the new plan should be coming in soon.”
The one-story idea is one in a list of changes made to the original airport expansion plan that at one time included adding a Homer’s restaurant at the new terminal. The restaurant is no longer in the plans as well.
“We have gone through a few different plans over the last couple of years as we have learned our budget and what kind of grant help we might be able to receive,” Rogers said.
The budget for the expansion is $3.5 million. Last year, the budget was expected to be around $5.7 million, but Rogers said that changed when the airport was pulled from a bond issue.
“The airport was tied to
the same bond as the new justice complex,” he said. “There was still a lot to work out on our end, including layout, price and things like that. We still had a lot of questions, and the city needed to get started on the police and courts building. The city took the airport out of the bond to avoid holding up that project.”
Rogers said Mayor Joe Smith found a way to give the airport money for the expansion, but the $5.7 million dropped down to about $3 million.”
Rogers said that along with price tags, officials have to think about the actual layout of the airport because the one-story building might require the removal of the Experimental Aircraft Association’s hangar.
Jerry Homsley, president of the nonprofit entity, requested that the Experimental Aircraft Association be given a new 40-year lease and have the rate reduced to $1 per year. He also requested the airport spend $150,000 so the organization can build a new hangar.
“Then you can even lease out our old hangar for around $1,000 a month,” Homsley said.
Deputy City Attorney Marie-Barnarde Miller said that for the airport to be able to agree to such a lease, the organization would have to prove how it would benefit taxpayers.
“We aren’t for everyone in the community,” Homsley said. “A dog park can only be used by dogs, but we still have those.”
Rogers said convincing taxpayers that the deals are worth it will be an uphill battle, even for a nonprofit organization.
“We have learned this in the past trying to get ‘yes’ votes at City Council,” he said. “Their constituents already think the airport is just a bunch of rich guys with planes.
“It’s hard to get the average citizen to see the economic benefit of the airport.”
Airport Commission member Don Blakey said he couldn’t wrap his mind around both the $1 lease and the $150,000 for a new hangar. He said if the organization chose to pay the normal lease amount, then accommodations for the new hangar would be easier to swallow.
The decision was postponed until a more finalized plan for the airport expansion could be presented to the commission.
Despite all the challenges, Rogers said he hopes to get started on construction this year.
“We have been working on this project for a long time,” he said. “Hopefully it doesn’t take too long, but we are probably a few months away.”