"Concerns delay Deer Valley Airport plans"

["Stephen Irwin" <stepheni@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Monday, April 16, 2007

Concerns delay Deer Valley Airport plans
By Michael Clancy
The Arizona Republic


Deer Valley Airport is scheduled for a $135 million upgrade, but the
concerns of pilots who call the airport home are delaying final approval of
a new master plan. 

The airport in north Phoenix is one of the busiest of its kind in the
nation, with more than 400,000 operations - takeoffs and landings - a year.
Since the last master plan in 1986, several airport improvements were made
to keep up with Federal Aviation Administration rules. 

The biggest of those will open next Monday. A new air traffic control tower,
twice as tall as the old one, will start operating, giving controllers a
better view of the two runways from the airport's north side. advertisement


The master plan, expected to receive final approval in late summer or early
fall, calls for shifting a variety of airport services and small hangars to
the north as well - which has pilots concerned. They say that segregating
small planes on the north side will restrict their ability to utilize the
airport.

"It is going to change the character of the airport," said Ray Weigold,
president of the Deer Valley Pilots Association, a tenants group. "It will
be more like Scottsdale."

The Scottsdale Airport eliminated private pilots several years ago to focus
on corporate users.

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