"Gila airport project advances"

["Stephen Irwin" <stepheni@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Wednesday, May 9, 2007

Gila airport project advances
By Betty Beard
The Arizona Republic


Chandler and Sun Lakes residents may object to the potential noise, but a
Phoenix developer is pushing ahead with plans to commercially develop a
World War II-era airfield on the Gila River Reservation. 

Will Graven, the developer, says Memorial Airfield could one day rival
Scottsdale's airport, which has about 200,000 operations - takeoffs and
landings - a year. Memorial has more runway space, more land around it to
develop and a better location for businesses headed to downtown Phoenix, he
said.

"You can't operate big jets" in Scottsdale, Graven said.

While opposition grows in Sun Lakes and Chandler against commercialization
of the airfield, Graven is quietly working with the Maricopa/Queen Creek
Development Co., a Gila River reservation enterprise, to secure the
necessary permissions to develop it.

Members of the group are going door to door with Pima and Maricopa
translators to track down Gila River landowners and get their OK to
master-plan 1,500 acres on and near Memorial Airfield as well as 11,000
acres bounded by the Santan Freeway and Riggs Road from Price Road to
Maricopa Road for industry, retail and office uses. 

The eventual master plan would need approval from the Gila River Indian
Community. 

Luke Graven, business development manager for his father's North American
Building & Development LLC in Phoenix, also is working on the project.

"The land is worth more because of the airport, and the airport is worth
more because of the land," Luke Graven said. 

Will Graven said the longer of two runways at Memorial Airfield is 8,566
feet long, compared with a single 8,269-foot-long runway at Scottsdale
Airport. Memorial also has a second 6,000-foot runway and both are longer
than the two at Chandler Municipal Airport. Graven wants to expand the
longer Memorial Airfield runway to 10,000 feet.

The Sun Lakes Group, Concerned Residents About Memorial Airfield, contends
the airport would send noisy planes over Sun Lakes as well as conflict with
airspace at the Chandler Municipal and Stellar airports. They now have 8,300
signatures on a petition against it.

"Well, 8,300 votes will carry certain weight. We may hopefully be able to
persuade the Gila River community that it might not be the best idea," said
Erik Mikkelsen, a Sun Lakes resident and co-chairman of the group. 

His group has talked recently to Gila River and Bureau of Indian Affairs
officials.

Chandler and the Maricopa Association of Governments, a regional planning
group of Valley mayors, also have expressed concerns about potential
airspace conflicts if Memorial is developed.

MAG sent a request late last year to the Federal Aviation Administration
asking it to analyze the airspace at 16 airports in the Phoenix area,
including Memorial Airfield, said Harry Wolfe, a MAG analyst.

Greg Chenoweth, manager of Chandler Municipal Airport, said Memorial's
airspace would conflict with Chandler's and Stellar's but that it could be
minimized if Memorial kept its traffic to the west of Interstate 10, over
the reservation and south of Ahwatukee. 

Will Graven, a Phoenix builder and developer, has been working with the
Maricopa/Queen Creek Development Co., a reservation enterprise, to persuade
Gila River landowners that it would be a good idea to develop the World War
II-era airfield into a modern, general aviation airport. Graven said there
are about 3,600 landowners.

Alia Maisonet, a spokeswoman for the Gila River Indian Community, said
eventually the group would have to go through a zoning process and public
hearing on the reservation.

Graven is considering two modifications to minimize noise. One would be to
extend the main runway so planes would have to land and leave farther from
Sun Lakes. The second is to limit the airport to quieter aircraft known as
Stage 3.

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