It seems fairly obvious that in business to serve your clients well it’s necessary to have an understanding of those clients and their needs.
Not an awareness. That’s a lower bar. I’m suggesting the need for an actual understanding. A level of insight that leads to empathy derived from a common experience.
In short, if the provider of a good or service doesn’t have any personal experience with the use of that good or service, their ability to provide real value to their clients is diminished substantially.
Can you imagine hiring a mechanic who had never driven a car to diagnose and repair an issue with your vehicle? Consider how many of us would even think about engaging a financial advisor who didn’t have any personal or professional investments of their own? When shopping for a landscaper to upgrade the curb appeal of our home, would we seek references from the individual who lives on a beautifully manicured plot of land or the one who calls a high-rise apartment home?
These may seem like peculiar examples but there is a point to this line of reasoning, I promise you.
There are between 19,000 and 20,000 airports in the United States. Most are non-towered fields. Many are privately owned. A few hundred host commercial airline service and these are the airports most of the general public are familiar with.
The average man or woman on the street has one understanding of what it takes to create a desirable airport environment. Those of us who fly or own aircraft have an entirely different perspective on the topic. Understandably so.
Each of these thousands of airports has a controlling authority. It might be old man Clem who has owned and operated the field for decades, mostly for his own convenience and amusement. Or it might be controlled by an appointed or elected body of officials who represent the interests of the municipality, or county, or state that owns the field.
In most cases there is a single person who is deemed the manager or director of the airport. That individual shoulders the considerable burden of responsibility to be sure the lights come on, the facilities are in good repair, and that safety procedures are in place and being followed. They also have to balance the books, even if the ink at the bottom of the page is red.
Being an airport manager or director is no small thing. As with any job, to do it well requires a commitment to a high standard of performance. A little creativity wouldn’t hurt either.
When you get right down to it, the airport manager slot is a service position, not all that different from the one a kid has when they get their first job working in the food service industry.
That’s not intended to disparage either the food service worker or the airport manager. There really is a lot of commonality between the two. They both need customers to keep the business viable. They need to provide those customers with a level of service that keeps them coming back. Ideally, they serve their customers well enough that word of mouth recommendations from satisfied customers grows their customer base over time.
When you get right down to it, the most obvious and common difference between the two is that the kid eats the food his restaurant serves. More often than not the airport manager does not utlilize the services their facility offers.
That disconnect is important.
Not all airport managers are pilots, nor should they be required to be. But it wouldn’t hurt if they had some personal experience in that realm. Few have ever owned an aircraft, which makes it hard for them to truly empathize with the seriousness of the issue if their airport doesn’t host a maintenance operation.
Every airport I travel to seems to have a long waiting list of individuals who own an aircraft and hope to lease a hangar to house it. Yet hangars are not widely available. So, their very expensive and vulnerable investment sits outside in the weather, unprotected.
It’s rare that I meet an airport manager or director who has experience building or leasing real estate. It’s equally rare they have someone on staff who fills that gap on their behalf. Yet, leasing real estate is a primary function of the operation at many, if not most, airports.
Any airport with a long list of individuals waiting for a non-existent hangar to open up has a real estate development opportunity sitting in their lap. Yet the pursuit of that opportunity seems to be so low on the priority list it just doesn’t happen. As with far too many government-operated entities, the priority seems to be in finding reasons not to fill the void, rather than finding creative ways to meet the market and serve it well.
There are obstacles that present themselves in an effort to prevent any opportunity from being beneficially exploited. History is full of people explaining in great detail why something or other can’t be done. It is also pockmarked with the story of people who went and did something anyway.
The automobile, the telephone, the airplane, and the personal computer were all publicly ridiculed as expensive, potentially dangerous products that couldn’t or shouldn’t find a place in the marketplace. Yet they all did. In each case because a small group of people, often led by one motivated individual, bucked the status quo and did what could be done for the benefit of themselves and others.
We need a mind-shift in general aviation — one that skews away from finding reasons not to pursue opportunity. We could use some creative thinking that seeks out solutions, innovation, and partnerships that will serve us all well into the future.
It’s time we get started.
David, I apologize for my delay in answering your questions. Please read my reply to your questions below.
1. What percentage of your hangers turn over each year?
As of today (7-23-2024) we have 51 applicants on our T-Hangar Waiting List. We also have 28 T-Hangar at the airport. Percentage of turn-over is around 10% (maybe 2-3 T-Hangar become available each year). FYI – The next applicant on our T-Hangar Waiting List who will be offered the next available T-hangar was added to the list in April 2018.
2. How are rental rates set? Why haven’t you raised rents to a level that will create more turnover?
Rates that we set for our 10-Unit T-Hangar built in 2004 and our 9-Unit T-Hangar built in 2017 were set at a combination of a 20-year ROI and surround airport T-hangar market rates. Why rents were not raised were a combination of trying to deliberately keep rate low and make hangar space available to any aircraft owner/operator regardless of their ability to pay. In hindsight, that was a mistake, but try explaining that to T-Hangar tenants. Remember, in my original response to this article when I said, ” All too often when the airport manager proposes an increase in the rents and fees imposed upon the tenants and users of the airport, the airport manager is met with resistance from those very same tenants and users. Often, I’ve been told that it’s the airport sponsor’s (the municipal and/or county government owner) responsibility and obligation to keeping rents and fees low and provide those services and facilities so desired and expected by the general aviation community at a rate that is effectively, an operating loss.”
3. Do you audit the use of the hangers? Are there people storing old planes that they do not fly? Are people storing boats and motorcycles rather than planes? Etc
Oh, YES. All our T-Hangars are being used exclusively for aeronautical purposes (storage of FAA registered aircraft).
Bob
There should be room on an airport to build tee hangars at a low cost as opposed to the high priced steel building for $150,000 to $200,000.
The pay back as an investment is not there in a rental.
I would propose a condominium type set up. Each hangar owner pays an equal share of the construction.
Of course there would have to be agreements . Keep it all simple
To Mr Leavens….Not sure where you are, but a shelter isn’t a good option for places with lots of snow every year. It may be adequate for you, not for me. I want to store the tools and supplies needed to maintain the aircraft – that’s not going to happen in a shelter.
To the others who recommend joining the advisory board – can’t. The county that owns the airport decided to eliminate the advisory board a number of years ago. To make matters more interesting, the county doesn’t publish meetings of the county commissioners, in direct violation of state law. We’ve tried, but it’s lawyer v lawyer and we’re no closer to any solution.
To add insult to injury – the airport runs a quarterly “tenant” meeting except…it’s a weekday morning event, when most of us are working to pay for the avgas, the hangars, the tower, and so on.
I have no problem paying the slightly higher fuel cost to support my home base but every time we turn around, the airport is doing something else to discourage us. There are over 300 aircraft based here, it’s not a “mom & pop” operation.
Why are we concerned about concrete pads and enclosed T-hangars? All aircraft really need is weather protection – a roof over the top to keep the sun and precipitation off them. There is no ‘security’ in an open structure, buy any serious thief knows how to break into a hangar. Phone poles and laminated beams provide all the needed structure. The roof can be corrugated sheet steel, pitched to drain off the water. The structure shown at the top of the article covering the Citabria is far more elaborate than any owner needs. The ‘cheap’ solution is perfectly adequate formost of us.
An excellent point, Bill. I agree completely.
A shade cover work if you only want a place to park the aircraft out of the sun and light rain.
But most of us have a lot of tools and parts, a bench or 2, an air compressor, which needs 120 vac, since we work on our aircraft, on maintenance items, cleaning , and A&P work.
All of these need to be secured out of the weather.
So, a secure hangar is preferred for those of us who do a lot of the work on our aircraft.
My old Cessna 175B needs a lot of TLC.!!
Oh, and in the North-East it snows a lot. A shade cover is pretty worthless in the cold, winter snow.!!!
The solution is not to run off every pilot that operates on the financial margins. There are solutions to the costs. Contractors and suppliers are not going to lower the costs of construction, so the costs need to be addressed from another source. In the state where I reside, that solution comes from the State Aviation fund. A portion of the fuel taxes paid on Aviation fuel to the state gets turned back to the board for investment into the airports to fund things the FAA typically doesn’t. One of those items is hangar space. All it takes is some planning and coordination between the airport manager, the state, and the FAA. Often times the state assists in funding of hangar projects as much as 60%. This is not money from any municipality’s general fund, but money the pilots are paying to the state in their fuel taxes. The hangars are built with a much lower local investment, with the consequence being that the airport can provide hangar space at reasonable rates. With proper planning, small and regional airports can have adequate hangar space provided at a reasonable cost that doesn’t squeeze out the pilots that operate on a financial budget. This notion that one must be wealthy in order to fly will eventually be the death of aviation and is utterly unnecessary. But it does require creative solutions and thinking beyond just squeezing every cent you can from those perceived to be wealthy because they scraped together the funds to buy a 70 year old airplane.
JS, what State are you referring to?
My question exactly. The topic of state funded assistance for construction of hangars has been brought before the state DOT and aviation officials that I’ve been associated with during the last 8 years and no action has been initiated. I am aware of a few other state aviation agencies that do participate in the construction costs toward hangar but neither of the 2 state aviation agencies I’ve been associated with. It’s not that difficult to look up your state’s aviation agency’s website, search for state assisted airport grant programs and identify what airport construction projects are eligible for state grants. Typically, state grant assistance is made toward FAA AIP eligible projects and while hangar construction is an FAA AIP eligible project, the AIP National Priority Rating for hangar construction is so low, the airport sponsor is pretty much required to address higher NPR safety and non-compliant existing airfield issues before you trickle down to using AIP grants for hangar construction.
My bet: Washington State
Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) Aviation division produced an Airport Investment Study. It’s a complex topic; there may be other state’s with similar approaches. If so, I’m not aware.
Here’s the Executed Summary from WSDOT Aviation’s website:
https://wsdot.wa.gov/sites/default/files/2021-10/aviation-ais-solutions.pdf
The state of MT allocates grants n loans to airports from revenue collected from the sale of aviation fuel.
As an airport manager (entering my 37th year in the profession), allow me to chime in. I appreciate the passion that the general aviation community has for its local airport. Believe it or not, the airport manager typically shares in that same passion. And I believe, like myself, the airport manager wants to provide those services and facilities so desired and (often) expected by the general aviation community. But one thing that I’ve learned throughout my career, that one constant, is passion often blinds the economic realities of managing, operating, maintaining, and providing those services and facilities so desired and expected by the general aviation community. Let me offer a recent example.
My airport has (today) a T-Hangar Waiting List with 50 names. In 2017, the airport sponsor provided general fund resources (taxpayer’s money) used to finance the construction of a new 9-Unit T-Hangar building at a turn-key project cost of $567,057 (the equivalent of $63,006 per Unit). A note about the project, that 9-Unit T-Hangar building was constructed over an existing paved apron so there were no costs associated with the need to construct any taxilanes or aprons adjacent to each unit. The paved surfaces were already there. The $567,057 was exclusive to the construction of the 9-Unit T-Hangar building. Beginning in 2022 demand for additional t-hangars encouraged the airport sponsor to seek competitive bids for the construction of a second 9-Unit T-Hangar building identical to the 2017 building. Only one bid was received at a turn-key construction cost of $1,698,000 (for the identical building built only 5 years earlier). My jaw fell to the floor when the bid was read aloud as I said to myself there was NO WAY that the airport sponsor would spend the equivalent of $170,000, per-Unit, of taxpayer’s money so 9 residents (who would be stereotype as rich enough to own their own airplane) from a population of 250,000 residents, would have a garage built to park their airplane (harsh remark, but true). So, we repackaged the bid and separated the concrete foundation from the purchase and construction of the T-Hangar building itself and rebid the project in early 2023. Bids were received and an award was made at $787,890 (two change orders added $97,000 to the total project cost).
The condition imposed upon the use of Taxpayer’s general fund resources that paid the $885,000 cost of the new 9-Unit T-Hangar building was that there would be a return on investment (payback) within 15-years at 4% interest. Using a simple EXCEL loan amortization schedule, a 15-year return on investment required a “minimum” rental fee at $727 per Unit, per month. An added $50 a month utility (electric) and routine maintenance fee along with a $30 a month long-term depreciation fee was added for a leased rental fee of $800 per Unit, per month. We ran through the entire T-Hangar Waiting List of 64 names (early 2023) before we found 9 applicants willing to pay $800 per month for a brand-new T-Hangar. The airport sponsor will not see a profit generated from these new 9 T-Hangars until 2,039 (and that’s if we’re guarantied 100% occupancy).
The harsh reality is the economics of managing, operating, maintaining, and providing those services and facilities so desired and expected by the general aviation community are not cheap. My general aviation airport’s FY25 Operating Budget is set at $1,097,480 (utilities $150,500; airfield and buildings repairs and maintenance $571,848 including $100,000 to mark and restripe all pavement markings to meet FAA standards; $73,000 contracted grass cutting/mowing; $63,700 for vehicle gate/access control parts; and $43,000 for airfield lighting repairs and replacement are just to name a few budget expense line-items). And none of that $1,097,480 includes the $300,000 10% required airport sponsor’s local match toward the $3,000,000 FAA Airport Improvement Program grant we’re anticipating we’ll receive in August/early September 2024).
A final thought because I anticipate readers of my comment will respond that general aviation airports should be owned, operated, and maintained by private, profit driven, operators and not owned, operated, and maintained by mismanaged municipal and/or county governments. Another thing that I’ve learned throughout my entire career, another constant, is the municipal and/or county owned, operated, and maintained airport is not allowed or permitted to operate as a financially “Breakeven” (and forget about a profit driven motive) enterprise department where rents and fees imposed upon the tenants and users pay all costs associated with owning, operating, and maintaining the airport. All too often when the airport manager proposes an increase in the rents and fees imposed upon the tenants and users of the airport, the airport manager is met with resistance from those very same tenants and users. Often, I’ve been told that it’s the airport sponsor’s (the municipal and/or county government owner) responsibility and obligation to keeping rents and fees low and provide those services and facilities so desired and expected by the general aviation community at a rate that is effectively, an operating loss. Yet in January 2024, the University of Florida published a report claiming that approximately 54% of the nearly 5,000 public owned airports in the United States are failing to perform as well as they should be doing, mostly due to simple mismanagement. The target of that “mismanagement” were airports owned by local governments. The recommended solution to this claim of “mismanagement” was those airports should be managed by “for-profit” businesses.
If you believe that your local general aviation airport is being “mismanaged” and would benefit from being managed by a “for-profit” business, then I would encourage you to familiarize yourself with the FAA’s Airport Investment Partnership Program (AIPP), formerly known as the Airport Privatization Pilot Program). Created with the 1996 FAA Reauthorization Act and amended in 2012 and again in 2018 the intended purpose was to explore privatization as a means of generating access to various sources of private capital for airport improvement and development. The program permits the ownership of publicly owned airports (those airports commonly included in the National Plan of Integrated Airport Systems) to be transferred (through an approved application process) to Private companies that may own, manage, lease, and develop public airports. To date (in the 28-years existence of the AIPP) only 2 airports from those nearly 5,000 public owned airports in the United States have been approved by the AIPP. So, if you believe that your local general aviation airport can be better managed by a “for-profit” business then I would encourage you to contact your local airport sponsor and discuss the potential opportunities. But remember, the only resources that will be available to the private “for-profit” airport management business has available to generate the revenues needed to own, operate, maintain, and provide those services and facilities so desired and expected by the general aviation community will come from the rents and fees the new “for-profit” airport management business imposes upon the airport tenant and user.
Thank you for this information on the financial realities of managing a small airport. My local airport has similar issues of underinvestment and a long waiting list.
I have a few earnest questions. Note that I’m not suggesting you haven’t thought of these things.
1. What percentage of your hangers turn over each year?
2. How are rental rates set? Why haven’t you raised rents to a level that will create more turnover?
3. Do you audit the use of the hangers? Are there people storing old planes that they do not fly? Are people storing boats and motorcycles rather than planes? Etc.
Again, I don’t mean to suggest you haven’t thought of these things. I’m just curious what the answers are.
Thanks
Jamie, clearly you have never served in any of the roles you criticize as you show your ignorance of the “other side” of the airport operations. As one who has owned aircraft, flies general aviation aircraft, has built hangars, and serves on the local airport authority, your comments shot a total lack of the challenges the local airport operation faces.
First, the FAA in their grant assurance program set certain requirements that preclude some of the things you suggest. The FAA either don’t allow their funding to build hangars or fail to prioritize hangar building in favor of other projects. This leaves the funding of the hangars to the local airport operator or authority. They do frown on hangar rents that are “above market standard”, restricting the operators ability to set rental rates that are viable to justify the investment.
That leaves the local airport or authority to find ways to fund and build hangars. We’ve built more than 40 new hangars in the past 5 years and of course all are full with a waiting list. Easy to say “build more!” But the reality is that to build more, we have to access county tax revenues. The request for that money competes with the new local ball park, new pool, senior activities center, school lunch program, water system upgrades, and on & on. Guess what projects the county citizens value the most? It isn’t building hangars for the “rich guys” little airplane. We all know that this isn’t necessarily a “right guy’s” hobby but good luck convincing the general population of that. And guess which projects the elected county officials approve? The ones that gets them reelected.
If you’re really concerned about access to hangar space for the general aviation crowd, pick your pen up again and write the check to build those hangars on land leased from the airport operator. Show up to an airport authority meeting. Volunteer to assist in the committees for airport projects. Volunteer to serve on the Airport Authority. In other words, put down the rocks you’re throwing and GET INVOLVED.
You touch on a very good topic but you have demonstrated a very shallow knowledge of the problem.
Ed, I appreciate that you disagree with the perspective presented in this column, but your assumption about my experience is incorrect. I have served as an elected city commissioner in a town that owns and operates an airport. I’ve served as chairman of the Airport Advisory Committee that oversees that airport. I work with our local airport director currently as a volunteer to enhance safety and promote clear communication between entities using the field.
You have every right to disagree with me or anyone else. To suggest those who don’t share your perspective are inexperienced, ignorant, and wrong however…that’s neither insightful or productive.
What a good topic! Only problem is that of the thousands of Airport Managers there are many kinds. The big places with full time staff and better paid Managers usually are not an issue.
The small airport where there is a part-time manger (sometimes full-time), is where it gets sticky. I see basically 2 types here:
Type 1: A local who likes airplanes and has some knowledge of aviation. Might be a pilot, might not, actually interested in aviation. May not have staff or little help in running entire airport and sometimes the FBO. Can be part of the “good old boy” club, which creates other problems.
Type 2: A local who is a politically appointed non-aviation person. Maybe because no aviation people wanted to do it. May be because this person sees it as a stepping stone to his bigger city or county job. Most know very little about aviation, some don’t want to learn (some do).
Do what apartment owners do (was once one of those): raise rents annually and just brush-off the screams. For every tenant who leaves in disgust there are 10 more on a waiting list who want to rent those now-vacant spaces.
GA is a horrendously expensive hobby. Fueling-up your Cessna 172 for a little spin to get to another state to have lunch costs more than filling the tank of your Bayliner for a day on the lake — both typically around $300 or more. This out of the paychecks of guys with families. You need to park your airplane somewhere, so quit crying the blues over that rented slot for it. You bought the airplane, now bear the cost of housing it somewhere. Simple.
Better facilities made available at little airports would attract a higher monied class of GA owners who appreciate the improvements in amenities. This has been demonstrated time and again in virtually all businesses. Even cosmetic upgrades to storefronts bring in more customers. Airport field owners: go for it. Fix-up your joint, wave goodbye to the pouters and say hello to the newbies.
Regards/J
How long have you been a pilot, and/or owned a GA plane? Ever rented a hangar?
No to all, but I have close buddies who are pilots and have known a field owner. My friends realize the costs of running a business and an airplane and don’t complain at an itti-bitti ramp fee after pumping $450 worth of av gas into their twin. Some of my other distant tangential acquaintances in the GA hobby really can’t afford it and skimp in the maintenance which results in smoking craters in the ground. There is no free lunch or anything else in this world. /J
Good article. The primary problem are government-owned airports as the managers and boards that run these are not motivated by the need to make a profit. The shadowy airport consultants convince them to apply for government grants for gold-plated “improvements” that rarely help private pilots, especially sport aviation. I used to sell low-cost, self-service fuel systems to airports and often found myself at odds with the consultants manageing the projects. They wanted large, expensive fuel systems since the earn a cut of the total project value. An open-minded, business-oriented airport will lease land for 50 years to investors to build and operate hangars and fuel systems. Unfortunately such people are rare in government and even more scarce in government airports. Private airfields are another story however. Either they make money, or they close.
Pilots tend to be good at complaining about, but poor at paying for, airport services. Somebody has to foot the bill and local governments are tired of doing so. Pilots and aircraft owners are a tiny part of most communities and the rest have very legitimate, sometimes urgent, needs. Airport ops need to pay for themselves without much reliance on local funding. We should respect that need, but often don’t.
For example, my home field with about 50 active based planes has a 50 year old fuel farm. It routinely breaks, resulting in complaints. But replacement cost is roughly $150k – $200k! Would each owner chip in or loan to the airport $4,000 for a new farm? Not a chance. Charge an extra $1/gallon to pay for it? Might work, except most of those planes fly way less than 100 hours/year. Take 50 hrs at 10 gph with a $1 surcharge, that’s $500/yr/plane or $25,000/year – a 10 year pay off. Might work, except guys are already flying out 50 miles to get $0.50/gallon cheaper fuel elsewhere! So who pays for a new fuel farm? “Somebody else” is not going to do it forever.
Support your local airport! Balance the requests with the understanding that the money for them doesn’t grow on trees.
It always amazes me how cheap SOME pilot/owners are. They fly a $200,000 plane and gripe about paying $15 for overnight or ramp parking. A few fly a multi million twins and turboprops but love to whine about an FBO charging them to park on their ramp.
Let’s not leave out the little guys either … we seem to have some of those $50,000 owners who seem to think the radio from 1983 (that no one can understand a transmission from) could never be replaced because a few thousand is crazy expensive.
Every owner knows, aviation is expensive. Don’t buy more plane than you can afford.