![]() ![]() While corporate and business aviation makes up about 20 percent of the airport's traffic, the airport has seen its jet fuel sales more than double in the last four years and major corporations including Wal-Mart, Home Depot and other Fortune 500 companies fly from its runways, Bilyeu said. In recent years, Lone Star Executive Airport has seen its share of the boom of private corporate jet travel across the industry. Wing said the tower will improve the efficiency of his business and make the airport more attractive to other aircraft, in particular corporate aviation. They're going to be bigger, they're going to be faster," Bilyeu said.Ĭurrently, pilots are responsible for communicating with each other over an open frequency, said Brian Wing, president of Wing Aviation, an aviation and charter services company based at the airport. "We have a large increase in corporate traffic, higher-performing aircraft. Lone Star Executive Airport is home to about 260 aircraft and sees everything from military Apache helicopters to first-time pilots landing Cessnas to air ambulances to home-built aluminum aircraft to high-performing Gulfstream jets take off from its runways. ![]() Controlled airspaceĪ 118-foot-tall air traffic control tower is slated as the second major expansion project, which will cost about $2.6 million and will break ground in early 2007 and open in the spring of 2008.īilyeu said the diversity of traffic at the airport made the tower a priority. However, with the expansion project officially under way, the airport is now shifting to development. The airport must wait several more years until the nearby FM 1484 roadway is rerouted to begin extending the primary runway from 6,000 to 7,500 feet, Bilyeu said. Next year the airport will start maintenance on the primary runway and add a new taxiway, which will open up about a dozen acres for development of more hangar and office space. The rest of the expansion projects are funded 90 percent from federal dollars and 10 percent from county funds. The county decided to pay extra - about $1.2 million instead of $600,000 - to maintain the runway's length at 100 feet. When the $5.9 million project is finished in April 2007, the secondary runway will serve as backup if the primary runway is ever closed and will be more attractive to jets at the airport, Bilyeu said. ![]() The secondary runway will be extended from 4,000 to 5,000 feet and will be reconstructed with longer-lasting concrete instead of the existing asphalt. ![]() Runway expansionĬonstruction crews recently began digging up the secondary runway at the airport, built in 1943 as a naval facility during World War II. "Corporate aviation, that's what we're trying to attract," Bilyeu said. ![]()
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