Fear of not flying - Westfair Communications

It goes without saying, but we”™ll say it anyway: aviation is important to international business.

Nay, it”™s more; it”™s integral, it”™s an economic stimulus, it”™s part of the competitive dynamic.

Imagine if your source for left-threaded, titanium wing nuts for your outdoor-furniture manufacturing facility was China and you had to wait for them to arrive in the Hudson Valley as they traveled by rail, ship and truck? Your business would not last.

With that in mind, we were happy to see that acting New Jersey Gov. Richard J. Codey signed a bill that gives the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey the go-ahead to buy Stewart International Airport. The Port Authority intends to spend $78.5 million for the 2,400-acre property and hold onto it for 93 years, the remainder of the lease held by National Express Corp. Yes, it will relieve congestion at the metro-area airports, but it will also act as a catalyst for making the region more attractive for business, especially those that are currently involved in international trade or intending to dive into the global marketplace.

Stewart has been in a holding pattern for too long. It remains in that pattern for business travelers. It”™s great that JetBlue and AirTran have come on board, but their direct-flight destinations are restrictive, unless of course you plan on traveling to sunny destinations down South. But getting to, say, a business meeting in Minneapolis is going to take some time, since you can”™t get there from here direct via these two airlines. (For AirTran it would require a trip to its Atlanta hub, a layover and then a direct flight. For JetBlue, you just can”™t, since they don”™t fly to the state. The others at the airport, Northwest Airlines, American Airlines, Delta Connection and U.S. Airways Express will get you there eventually, but at a pricey cost. Fly out of any of the other major airports and the cost is cut in half, along with the travel time.)

We”™re hopeful that as the Port Authority grows the airport and attracts more airlines ”“ thus increasing competition ”“ the cost of traveling from Stewart will also drop.

We can”™t sympathize nor empathize with several environmental groups that have made several near-impossible suggestions in keeping the airport “regional.”

They include:

* Restrict flights near state parklands.

* Direct air traffic over busy highways.

* Since cargo planes tend to be older models, allow only the newest and quietest aircraft to use Stewart.

* And the kicker is to ban overnight flights from 10 p.m. to 7 a.m.

Yikes! Talk about anti-business.

We”™ll take back that we don”™t empathize with the groups; their concerns might be off-mark but their intentions, albeit skewed, should be noted. As the airport grows, and it will, a close eye should be kept on its development. Some ragged plan that runs amok will only make Stewart a textbook study as ways not to grow an airport.

From Bahrain to Toronto to Melbourne to Baltimore-Washington, airports are growing.

One fairly recent innovation in the development of airports is the aerotropolis concept. John D. Kasarda, director of the Kenan Institute of Private Enterprise at the University of North Carolina, is considered the leading developer of the concept in defining the roles of airports in shaping future urban growth. According to papers he has written, airports are no longer just for airplanes; they have become “multimodal, multifunctional enterprises” generating commercial development beyond their borders. He points to the creation of shopping malls ”“ with retail, restaurant and leisure components ”“ merged into terminals, along with hotels, convention centers and foreign trade zones.

One emerging “airport city” in the United States in Dallas-Fort Worth, which in turn has helped develop Los Colinas, a community of 13,000-plus single and multifamily homes, 21 million square feet of office space, 8.5 million square feet of light industrial and 75 restaurants.

Before Stewart makes a move forward, they might be well wise to take a look at the concept and check out the pluses and minuses.