Prince Albert Airport. (File photo/paNOW Staff)

By Dawson Thompson

Airport Upgrades

Airport Strategic Master Plan approved by city council

Jul 20, 2021 | 5:14 PM

The City of Prince Albert has a better idea of the long term outlook at Glass Field now that the Airport Strategic Master Plan has been released.

The plan suggests over $40 million worth of upgrades and projects over the next ten years.

“It’s an overall global look at the operations of the airport in the past, present and what we need to do in the future to make it grow and be successful,” Wes Hicks, Director of Public Works told paNOW.

The recommendations in the master plan will be used by Public Works to create the priority for development of the annual airport budget. Authors of the master plan looked at stakeholder engagements, efficiencies and weaknesses, and upgrade requirements among other areas to improve service.

“We then take all that information to develop a plan for future growth, like what kind of areas we could expand on for other air side businesses related to aviation and then build a development business plan out of that with a 5 year, 10 year and 20 year plan of things we would like to do in those time periods,” Hicks said.

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Among the most immediate plans are to spend $814,000 this fiscal year on mobile assets like sanding trucks and plows. In 2022, the Airport Advisory Committee will look to spend almost $5 million on apron reconstruction and expansion. The areas where the airplanes park are deteriorating according to findings released in the master plan.

The only way the majority of these expensive projects can move forward is with grants received from the federal and provincial governments, Hicks said.

“The dollar values are so large that they require us to be able to apply for the grants under the ACAP (Airports Capital Assistance Program) with a federal program or provincial program,” he said. “We’ve been successful in the past. Even more recently since the report has been written, we’ve received four grants in this fiscal year alone adding up to millions of dollars.”

Among the biggest projects in the master plan is the development of a new terminal space that would make the airport more competitive and allow more cargo, arrival and departure space, car rental, food services and more. According to the master plan, the construction for this space will begin in 2026.

Hicks said the master plan also looked at different aeronautical opportunities, private hangars and rentals, flight training, and float plane operations.

The master plan also outlined some of the current weaknesses of the airport. While scheduled flights remain relatively even, the number of passengers using chartered flights has dropped significantly. Hicks said that was due to a number of factors out of the city and airport’s control, including Cameco mine closures and shift rotations moving from one to two weeks and an ATR 42 crash in 2017 that grounded the fleet and airline mergers.

The items are on the Airport Advisory Committee work plan and will be focused on this fiscal year.

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Dawson.thompson@pattisonmedia.com

On Twitter: @dawsonthompson8