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Airport Officials Promise to Restore Trees to Hills Made Bare By Runway Construction

Posted on: Thursday, 23 March 2006, 09:00 CST

By Paul J. Nyden, The Charleston Gazette, W.Va.

Mar. 23--The denuded hillsides near Yeager Airport will be reclaimed and green again by the end of 2007, according to members of the West Virginia Regional Airport Authority.

Ed Hill, chairman of the authority, said during a monthly meeting on Tuesday, "We are often reminded of the moonscape out there. It will take awhile. But 50 years from now, you will never know anything was different."

The Airport Authority has been working on building a longer runway on the hilltops that have been flattened and timbered.

Rick Atkinson, executive director of Yeager Airport, believes the areas will be largely restored within 10 years.

"Our plan is to replant hardwood trees in the same mixture that was there originally. We will also be able to plant 10-year-old trees in the most visible areas. There will be a mixture of trees."

Atkinson said he and Kanawha County Commissioner Kent Carper met with Gov. Joe Manchin last week about getting a $1 million loan from the state's Economic Development Authority to repair an existing airplane hangar and build a new one.

"We will submit our request by April 1," Atkinson said. "It will be on the agenda for the board's approval at their April meeting."

The loan would help finance $600 million in improvements to Yeager Airport's main hangar and more than $300 million to build a new hangar.

Priscilla Haden, a board member, presented plans to spend $20,000 on a set of five screens to be placed throughout the airport to update passengers about arrival and departure times, as well as showing maps of where incoming planes are located.

The new system will be financed by selling 30-second, onscreen advertisements for $150 a month.

The baggage and boarding areas will each have two screens, while a fifth screen will be put up in the flight-information area of the terminal.

Haden said the airport itself will begin handling all advertising within the airport facility, after declining to renew a private contract that expired last month.

The Airport Authority will keep contracts with Compensation Strategies, owned by Nelson Robinson, and The Manahan Group, owned by George Manahan. They are negotiating a new contract for public relations work with Michael Plante and Associates.

Atkinson said the airport is continuing to work on plans to get a daily flight from Yeager to JFK Airport in New York City, especially since the number of passengers to New York has continued to increase in recent months.

Hill added, "The idea to have flights to Myrtle Beach is not completely dead."

To contact staff writer Paul J. Nyden, use e-mail or call 348-5164.

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Copyright (c) 2006, The Charleston Gazette, W.Va.

Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

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Source: The Charleston Gazette

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