Airport Cost Trade-Offs
Cross-posted from TalkRadio101 Forum…
I am not an opponent of a new airport ever, my career was in airports, but I have been a critic of this plan. The consultants have played this airport board like a violin, billing almost $40Million so far, mostly to “entitle” the “free land”, and there is still a $6 Milliion mitigation bill to pay. Most of us can’t afford that kind of free land. Lately, FDOT has been buying the free land directly by accepting it as 50/50 matching “when acquired by the airport” for FDOT cash - thats about $8 Million so far.
The people who planned this decided in 1999 where it would go, and studies since then have apparently been to paper over that decision. Who was that? “Not you, not me, must have been that man behind the tree…” I have seen this rodeo about 35 times around the country and been on the other side of the table. It may very well be a “done deal” but it is not pretty when I look closely, and all I am interested in is that the taxpayers know what they are getting.
To get back to the subject, benefit-cost is to determine the INCREMENTAL benefits vs the INCREMENTAL cost, and a small airport has surprising capabilities that must be recognized before claiming additional benefits. The small airport at Ft Myers was carrying traffic in 1982 that exceeds the forecast here for 2030, before the new airport there (it was also growing over 20% per year instead of standing still). The point of the 106-passenger comparison is: In 30 years, we get one more 737 per day “there” than we do “here” and we pay (this months estimate) $331 Million NOW - is it worth it? For passengers, clearly no. How about charters? FAA says it takes 250 visits a year (5 per week) to build a runway for a particular airplane not otherwise served. Voila! Airport proposes 5 per week from UK - total fiction and FAA rejected it, limits fed funding to 6800 ft. Optimists don’t like these numbers, but FAA only misses operation forecasts by 3% and passenger by 9% - they allowed these guys 13% more than FAA-TAF.
Jobs? out of my field (and FAA’s). I don’t know but I think $300 to $500 million invested in FSU-PC would be more likely to pay off. The jobs estimate declined from 20,000 in 1999 to 4,000+ when required to be recorded testimony. That was over 23 years or 175+ per year, mostly warehousing and service.
Real estate? You bet, after all it is a LAND DEAL - sale/redev of of airport, appreciation of remote land because we have transferred our air traffic there (and grown it to 7 percent differential in 30 years). Those 7 percent are not grounded without new-PFN, after all they are only siphoned from Okaloosa/Eglin IF THE AIRLINES PRICE IT LOW ENOUGH. If trends continue, Okaloosa will have the price advantage and many of those who drive 25 miles to West Bay will just keep driving 50 more.
These are some of the tradeoffs involved. It is one of those grand visions that nobody enjoys questioning - remember when the incinerator was going to be profitable? Dozens of paid advocates said so, and then went home as Bechtel just did, after tucking $30 Million or so in the purse. There is a much more conservative way to go about this, but the sunk cost has grown so big it is hard to contemplate abandoning it.