Business View Magazine - Dec 2023

Luckily for the airport, it was able to pay for the $3.1 million apron reconstruction project with a combination of AIP (Airport Improvement Program) funding from the FAA, which covered a third of the cost, a little over a million dollar grant from the City of Devils Lake, and another million-plus from North Dakota’s Aeronautics Commission. “So we were able to get that project going and it’s pretty much completed now,” Cruse reports. “We had five or six projects, but it’s boiled down to two, and only because of the substantial amount of help from those two organizations.” THE NEW TERMINAL DVL’s 6,148-sq.-ft. terminal was built in 2005 and the new upgrades will essentially double its size. It will add more vending machines for its commercial travelers, as well as an ATM and changing room for mothers and their infants. The lighting will be updated and there will be a bigger holding area for passengers as well as a new boarding bridge so that they won’t have to go outside to get to their flights in the harsh winter weather. “That’s going to be nice for North Dakota,” Cruse says in an obvious understatement. “One of the other big updates is we’ll be having a baggage carousel now. Other than that, the TSA screening area will be expanded quite a bit and, apparently, they have some new technology coming out, so we’ll be ready for when it comes. Overall, we’re just giving everybody a little more space.” An estimated completion date for the updated terminal is scheduled for late March to early April in 2024. REGIONAL CARRIER SEEKS NEW CERTIFICATION Of course, just as one fire has been quelled, there’s always another one beginning to smolder. This conflagration concerns DVL’s commercial carrier, SkyWest Airlines, whose contract with the airport has expired, and who wishes to change its designation from a carrier that operates under the FAA’s Part 121 rules, which all the big airlines have to follow, to a charter service that operates under the less stringent Part 135 rules. This will allow the airline to reconfigure its Bombardier CRJ200 Yourpartner inhealth. For more than 121 years, our hospital and clinic has provided care that’s close to home, because that’s where healing happens. You can count on us for everything from routine care to advanced procedures – and the humankindness that connects us all. We are proud to be a 2023 Top 100 Critical Access Hospital. CHIStAlexiusHealth.org/DevilsLake 345 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE VOLUME 10, ISSUE 12 DEVI LS LAKE REGIONAL AI RPORT