Northeast Iowa Regional Airport board looks ahead to big projects

By Bob Steenson, bsteenson@charlescitypress.com

The North Cedar Airport Authority has received almost $6 million in state and federal funds for improvements at the Northeast Iowa Regional Airport since the group was formed in 2006.

A look at the history of infrastructure funding at the airport was part of a review of new capital improvement plans for the facility — the primary item on the agenda for a workshop session of the airport authority Wednesday afternoon.

“We’ve got, give or take, a $120,000 budget-$130,000 budget, so it’s not like we’re flush with cash,” said authority Chairman Jeff Sisson. “It’s all how you leverage things. Anyway, we’ve done a good job.”

Speaking to Bill Kyle, the airport manager and the son of Lyle Kyle, who, with partner Norbet Baltes, started Charles City Aeronautics Inc. in 1957, Sisson said, “Bill, I think your dad would be surprised.”

Kyle responded, “I think father would be very proud. I think the improvements we’ve made on this place are kind of staggering, especially for a community of our size.”

The next big project, already approved and scheduled for next year, will be the largest single expense in the airport’s history.

The $3.36 million project to reconstruct the taxiway at the airport will be paid entirely with federal funds. A usual 10% local match requirement was dropped this year as extra funding became available through federal COVID-19 economic relief.

Coming in the future, however, could be a project that will dwarf everything done at the airport so far.

The capital improvement plan lists the 4/24 crosswind runway — currently grass — as a candidate for paving in the next several years, including acquiring additional needed land. The price tag on that is $6.65 million, of which 90% would come from Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) funds.

But Kyle suggested a possible change to the schedule, instead making the lengthening of the airport’s main 4,000-foot 12/30 runway a priority.

In addition to being the airport’s FBO — fixed base operator — Kyle is president of North Iowa Air Service, which offers charter flights, aircraft maintenance and repair and pilot training at its Charles City location.

Kyle said he talked with his son, Todd Kyle, who is vice president and director of operations for the business, and they agreed it’s more important to lengthen the current runway than to pave the grass runway.

“It’s more important to him running the flight department to extend 12/30 to something over 5,000 feet, as much as 5,500 if he can get it, so that we can be not limited on takeoff with the Learjet,” Kyle said.

Kyle said there are currently three turboprop-engine aircraft and two jets based at the Charles City airport, but one of the turboprops will likely be switched out for another jet within the next couple of years.

Joe Roenfeldt, project engineer with Clapsaddle-Garber Associates Inc. of Marshalltown, the airport’s engineering consultant, asked when they’d like to see that project on the schedule.

“I’m thinking mid-2020s,” Sisson said. “We want to get it done now, but what are we looking at for that project?”

Kyle said a number in the capital improvement plan report puts the cost of extending and widening the main runway at about $11.5 million, but he’s not sure where that number came from.

“It’s an eight-figure number, which means we’re going to have to find seven, just so everybody understands that,” Sisson said, referring to the 10% local match the airport would need to come up with for an FAA-funded project. In other words, if the project costs $11.5 million, the local airport authority would need to come up with $1.5 million.

Roenfeldt said he would do some research and come up with more information on a project to extend 12/30, including costs.

Part of getting the FAA to back the project might include having to justify it through the number of operations at the airport, he said.