Committee looks at parking garage for airport

HIGHFILL — Parking is tight at Northwest Arkansas Regional Airport, and a parking garage to be built in the next few years might be the solution.

The Operations Committee of the Northwest Arkansas Regional Airport Authority board looked at two locations and three plans for a parking structure on Wednesday.

A parking deck could be situated in the western end of what is now short-term parking or across the street next to the terminal where the rental car lot is now.

Consultants told the committee the structure could be split between public parking and rental returns with the bottom two floors planned as rental car spots and the upper deck or decks for commuters.

Option one, a four-story parking structure in the shortterm lot, would cost about 400 parking spaces to put it on the ground, said Stephen Rebora, president of Desman Design Management told the committee. The structure would add 1,258 parking spaces: 560 for rentals and 698 for commuters.

“This would scratch both issues, rental and public,” said Mike Johnson, Operations Committee chairman.

It’s a realistic solution, said

Rebora, who didn’t endorse the site west of the terminal as a rental and commuter combination. A parking deck next to the terminal would have height limits. A geotechnical report indicated the water table is too high for an underground structure.

Scott Van Laningham, chief executive director for the airport, told committee members building on the rental parking lot would disrupt car rental services.

Rebora told the committee estimates predict a need for 500 to 1,200 new parking spaces at the airport in the next five to 10 years.

The airport probably will need a parking garage in the next five years, Van Laningham said after the meeting.

There are parking spaces under construction at the airport now. Parking lot expansion projects that are expected to finish by the end of the year will add 395 spaces to the economy lot and 58 spaces to the short-term lot, making a total of about 3,400 public parking spaces at the airport. Staff members said after the meeting that the lots are often full.