Updates about Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport (NWFBIA)

Wearing a hard hat amid the construction dust of the passenger terminal for the new Northwest Florida International Beaches Airport, it's hard to imagine that Southwest Airlines' first flight out of Panama City will take off on schedule on May 23.

But Airport Authority Chairman Joe Tannehill insists the new airport will open as planned next month.

"We'll make it. The windows may not be washed, but we'll make it," he said.


They'd better. This is the first international airport built in the U.S. in 15 years, so it's receiving a lot of attention.


"In my view, it's not an option. It's [May 23] a fixed date," said Lisa Walters, a Panama City attorney who is the immediate past chairwoman of the Bay County Economic Development Alliance.


"The globe is watching us," she said.


In particular, a group of executives who currently work in a Riverside Avenue office in Jacksonville are watching closely. Many economic development officials in the Panama City area are hoping the new airport will make the region more accessible and open up new opportunities. But no one will benefit more than The St. Joe Co., the Jacksonville-based company that owns 71,000 acres immediately surrounding the airport and 300,000 acres within 40 miles of the site.


"This is really the future of our company," said Rod Wilson, president of the West Bay Sector for St. Joe. West Bay is the name given to the land adjacent to the airport that St. Joe intends to develop.

The new airport is in a remote area of Bay County surrounded by largely undeveloped land. But St. Joe and area economic officials envision practically a new city sprouting from the airport.


"We are creating a new central business district for the region," said Kevin Johnson, St. Joe's vice president of economic development who was brought in last fall to market West Bay.


"We have a greenfield opportunity," Johnson said, referring to the vast area that is basically wide open for new and planned development.


"Greenfield opportunities are an anomaly.


"This is a very tide-changing opportunity for the state of Florida."


The opportunity is so important to St. Joe that after being headquartered in Jacksonville for three-quarters of a century, the company will move its offices to a new building in West Bay next year so it can monitor development of the region more closely.


"To me, it's about moving the company where the shareholders' assets are," said St. Joe Chief Executive Officer Britt Greene.
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Regarding international flights. There will be direct service to and from Orlando, so they should be able to connect there from their Luthansa flights. (Also, one-stop same plane service orginating from Ft. Lauderdale through Orlando) Regarding the taxis, guidelines have been established for transportation servicers that should improve service.

Does anyone think there will be at least one direct flight to Europe?

Thanks. Do you know how their baggage will connect?

That's a sticky wicket. Southwest, to the best of my knowledge, does not have connecting baggage agreements with other airlines. That's part of the low cost business model. If that, in fact, true, the bags will have to be claimed in Orlando and rechecked with Southwest.

How far is the Southwest terminal from arriving/departing international flights. Will be curious to see what the real process is. Will customs be handled in Orlando or West Bay or both?

I thought the whole point was to have customs in PCB.

Typically you arrive, go through passport control, collect your luggage, go through declarations, then recheck your luggage for domestic screening and go through security again yourself.

I compared a southwest flight with a delta flight from Detroit to the new Panama City airport. The southwest flight was about $350 and the Delta was about $370 - not much difference, but I hope there are sales. Delta's flight into Fort Walton Beach was $450. So, the new airport will be making it less expensive to get to SoWal. I will be looking for sales for sure.

I caught part of a radio ad this morning touting the new airport/Southwest and it sounded like they have added more new routes - Chicago Midway and another I didn't catch were mentioned in addition to Nashville, Baltimore, Houston, and Orlando.

P.S. Other airlines should take note - I am just one of the people loving their new ad campaign about "take my bag, not my money."

When an airport has "international" as part of the name, all that means is that there is onsite Customs available.

There are plenty of small border region airports that serve less than 20K commercial passengers a year that are 'International Airports' because the guy who mows the grassy areas next to the runways and cleans the toilets is also appropriately credentialed to serve as a part-time customs official when someone at the airport needs that service.

Hopes for a renewed discussion about building a crosswind runway at the new airport were dashed Tuesday when the Airport Authority board learned that millions of dollars might be needed to fix the site?s stormwater drainage system.

With just 40 days remaining before a scheduled May 23 opening, $4 million in specialized sand in a large filtration pond might have to be replaced. In addition, the wrong type of crushed rock was used for the support of more than 6 miles of under-drains.

The executive director of the Bay County Tourist Development Council has been earning his share of frequent flyer miles recently, promoting the opening of the new Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport.

Besides already having visited New York, Baltimore, Washington, D.C., and Houston, Dan Rowe is planning upcoming trips to Nashville, Tenn., and Orlando, talking to local newspapers and lifestyle magazines and giving interviews on local television stations.



.....

“That is what we are all about, telling the world about the new airport and Panama City Beach,” Rowe said. “There is a lot of interest in the opening of the new airport.”
Rowe is not the only regional tourism official on the road talking up the link between new airport’s potential and Southwest, which has started airing television commercials promoting Northwest Florida in key markets.


Butch Spyridon, president of the Nashville Convention & Visitors Bureau, recently spoke to the Walton County Chamber of Commerce about travel opportunities a new non-stop route will open between the new airport and Nashville, a city within which Southwest, the nation’s largest domestic airline, has operated for 15 years.


Southwest Airlines and TDC officials signed an agreement in November 2009 that coordinated spending local bed-tax funds with Southwest’s efforts to market the area.



A month later, Southwest announced it would operate eight daily nonstop flights to the new airport from Orlando, Nashville, Tenn., Baltimore and Houston, four “gateway” cities in which a strategic marketing message would appear.

As the Airport Authority races to complete the project by May 23rd, Southwest Airlines is already [COLOR=darkgreen ! important]selling[/COLOR] the new destination all over the country.
Bay County Tourist Development Council members received an update Tuesday on the latest marketing efforts for the area.


Southwest is currently running two commercials highlighting Northwest Florida's 17 hidden beaches, accessible through one destination, Northwest Florida Beaches International.
Southwest filmed the commercials a few months ago in various locations around town, featuring real Southwest employees.
They are hoping these advertisements will attract even more people with their low costs and zero baggage fees.
Some of the money collected through the TDC's 5th cent [COLOR=darkgreen ! important]sales tax[/COLOR]funded the commercials.

I am going to come back in my next life as a road engineer and add to that runway engineer. How could they have the "wrong rocks" under the runway that could be a problem as discussed on the 6 p.m. news!! Good grief. I swoon knowing that they are going to be paving my road. Yuck!!! I can't go into that here, wrong thread. But, how can they not have paved this runway to the most exact, correct specifications?! Should be story in the morning papers. Will have to catch the news again at 10.

"It could be no problem, it could be serious."
That's Airport Authority Chairman Joe Tannehill's assessment of the potential issue involving the backbone of the underground drainage system laid out over a substantial part of the airport property.


Contractors buried the maze of large pipes, then surrounded it with rock. But, instead of using hard, durable rock, workers apparently used a softer rock, which could deteriorate over time.


"It could be something that will require us to take a lot of rock, 80,000 cubic yards of rock out and put harder rock in," commented Tannehill.
Before they begin digging up asphalt, grass and concrete, board members want to test the rock to answer some key questions.


"The question is, the rock that is put in there, after testing, how long is it going to last? Is it going to be 50 years, 100 years, is it going to be 5 years?" asked Tannehill.



"That will be an issue for the engineers to address. I don't think it's quite that severe of an issue at this point in time," said Airport Authority executive director Randy Curtis.



The other issue is who's responsible for the error. Board members say they don't know who's at fault, or why they are only hearing about it now.


"The one consistent fact that's out there is it's either the engineers or the contractor. That will play out as we go into mediation, further discussions," Curtis said.



Despite the concerns, board members say it won't delay the airport's May 23 opening. But, it could delay other projects.


Because of the potential costs of replacing that soft rock, Tannehill now wants to put discussions of a cross-wind runway on hold.


"I'd like to say I deferred it," said Tannehill. "I'll probably be pushing the cross-wind runway after I go off the board."


Tannehill and Vice Chairman Bill Cramer's terms end in June.


Board members will hold a special meeting next week to further discuss the issues, including sand problems in the stormwater drainage system.
On a related note, contractors say they have finally managed to grow grass on the airport site -- about knee-high in some places. They say they went out of the design specs to find a solution.