CAA: GA News, "Florida airport to get FAA grants for repairs"

["Stephen Irwin" <stepheni@xxxxxxxxx>]

Wednesday, March 13, 2002 

Airport to get FAA grants for repairs
By ELLEN MAHLE
The Daytona Beach (FL) News-Journal


NEW SMYRNA BEACH -- The Federal Aviation Administration is sinking more
than half a million dollars into repairing the city's Municipal Airport
during the year ahead. 

Airport Manager Ron Wilsbach said the FAA has told him grant money
totaling about $650,000 would be available for a number of major
projects, including the update of the master plan, replacement of the
runway lights and refurbishment of the electrical vault that houses the
transformers. 

These funds represent 90 percent of the project costs. The state
Department of Transportation and the city of New Smyrna Beach each would
have to contribute 5 percent. 

The projects are imperative to keeping the airport functioning, Wilsbach
said, because without them, the facility would not be properly equipped
to handle the flight traffic. 

"The master plan is updated every five years to determine what
facilities the airport has and what needs to be done in terms of
refurbishment," he said. "The people who use the airport are invited to
meet with the consultants and myself and hash things out. It gives
everyone a chance to have input in where the airport is headed." 

The master plan forecasts potential use out to 20 years, Wilsbach said,
and has included in the past projects currently under way, such as the
reconstruction of the taxiways. One plan update Wilsbach anticipates is
the construction of a helipad for helicopters to land. 

Replacement of the lighting system is another project for which the
airport is eagerly anticipating funding from the FAA because it is more
than 20 years old, the manager said. 

The small lights that line the runway that provide a glide slip as
planes are coming in, known as PAPI (precision approach path indicator)
lights, are needed along runway 29. They currently are along runway 11. 

Wilsbach also said the airport needs to replace the medium-intensity
runway lights because they were direct buried into the ground without
the wires put into a plastic conduit for protection from the elements. 

"We want to put conduits in, which will protect the wires and make
repair much simpler," he said. 

In addition, funds from the FAA will be used to replace the transformers
in the power vault, Wilsbach said.


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