Business View Magazine | March 2020

204 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE MARCH 2020 are corporately-owned, with a waiting list of 40-plus for hangar space. “At the moment, we don’t have any Airport owned hangar openings, and the Airport does not have plans to build any hangars,” Lee reports. “We just finished a taxi lane extension project; it’s 200 feet wide and we extended it to 400 feet, which allows for the addition of four more corporate hangars along that extension. So, if a corporate flight department is looking to relocate and be near San Antonio, New Braunfels can accommodate. And our service is the best.” Currently, Lee says that he is focused on rehabilitating runway 17/35 and the east ramp and apron area. “We finished the master Plan update, which will take us out another 20 years,” he notes. “The Master Plan is calling for three phases based upon the current forecast. The first phase is to do infrastructure repairs and rehabilitation on the runway and the east apron. We are also reviewing proposals for engineering and design for a detention pond within the infield, which is going to help with stormwater runoff as we add new impervious cover to the south side of the airfield. With the taxi lane extension and potentially adding hangars, one of the concerns is where all the water goes.” “I just put in a letter of interest with TXDOT (Texas Department of Transportation) Aviation to see if we can get funding to redo the east ramp,” he continues. “We’re looking at a $6-8 million project to redo the asphalt on that side of the Airport. Also, some of the property under our RPZs (Runway Protection Zones) is not owned by the Airport. The FAA, with their new guidelines, would prefer airport sponsors owning the property underneath the RPZs, so we’re in the process to see if there’s any grant funding available so we can acquire the remaining parcels that underlie the runway protection zones. In Phase Two of the Master Plan, which begins in year five, we’re looking at engineering, design, and construction of another extension to our primary runway to 7,500 feet. And in the