"Editorial: Indianapolis airport terminal: clearing for takeoff"

Tuesday, August 19, 2003

Today's editorial
Airport terminal: clearing for takeoff
The Indianapolis (IN) Star


Our position is: Conservative funding plans for the new midfield terminal
still depend on industry's rebounding.

Plans for the city's new midfield airport terminal reflect arduous efforts
to provide both physical and financial security, but neither can be
guaranteed in today's political and business climate.

The $974 million project's design, prepared by the nation's largest
architectural firm and unveiled last week, combines striking looks with
plentiful amenities and a centralized, state-of-the-art security station to
replace the current fragmented system.

"The most safe and secure airport anywhere," as Mayor Bart Peterson calls
it, will not cost the taxpayers. But the realization of the new terminal,
set to open in 2007, will depend on the fortunes of an industry that was
already hurting before the 2001 terrorist attacks and has generated a spate
of bad news since. Indianapolis caught its share this spring with the
closing of a repair base for which the now-bankrupt United Airlines received
$300 million in tax incentives.

Thinking long term and counting on a general economic upturn that might lift
all boats and planes, Peterson and Indianapolis Airport Authority officials
have mapped out a dual course of self-sufficiency.

Funds for the project will be raised through passenger ticket fees, landing
fees, gateway rents and concessions. In the meantime, the authority plans to
issue $400 million next year in revenue bonds, acknowledging the possibility
that a further falloff in the airline business may necessitate more bonding.
Unlike general obligation bonds, these bonds would be paid for with airport
business proceeds rather than by taxpayers, but that will be grudging
consolation if the vitality of the industry is not sufficient to carry out
the airport modernization and expansion that the public sorely needs.

Clearly, local officials have not neglected the contingencies of doldrums
and disaster as they've forged ahead on a facility that aims to avert both.
If the national and global economies do their part, the Indy airport project
that was conceived three decades ago will land on a lucky number in '07.


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