Business View Magazine l January 2023

268 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE VOLUME 9, ISSUE 12 “We have also just completed a taxiway extension project for Runway 05 that was more like $4 million. This project is mostly complete and operational with a couple of minor items to finish. This will allow us to come up to FAA standards for our taxiway, creating a parallel taxiway that will make it a little bit easier for pilots to navigate to the terminal from the runway. This is being done by Barnhill Contracting and they are a great partner,” he determines. “We do have a couple of other upgrades to the airport,” he continues. “We had our weather system overhauled this past summer,which had not been working for the past three years. The next biggest project that we have coming, and we just awarded a contract for, is a new $2.3 million fuel farm.” This will replace the old fuel farm, which is now outdated, and allow us to not only provide self-serve aviation gas but also self- serve Jet fuel as well. During business hours we do offer full service, but this will allow charter jets and helicopters to be able to fuel up here 24 hours a day – this also includes some other upgrades to the fuel farm that deals with efficiency and safety,” Lewis outlines. Lewis is quick to point out several other valuable partnerships that keep the airport running smoothly and is adamant that first and foremost that includes the staff. He points out that his employees who work at the airport have stepped up in so many ways to make sure that service is always a priority. “A huge partnership is with the Division of Aviation for North Carolina,” he adds. “We wouldn’t have the money to be able to do the projects that we have done without them working with us. It takes millions of dollars to keep the airport running and we are just not going to bring that in locally.” Lumberton Regional is doing better now in terms we make complex projects simple barnhillcontracting.com paving the way