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Plans for airport in Bastrop worry neighbors

Privately-funded airport would target businesses; construction might begin by end of year.


AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Sunday, March 29, 2009

A proposal for a new airport off FM 969 in Bastrop County caught many residents by surprise, setting off a flurry of e-mails, letters to state officials and residents showing up to express their opposition at last week's Bastrop City Council meeting.

The proposal by an Austin developer with a history of activity in eastern Travis County is still in the early development stages, but it includes plans for an 8,000-foot runway on nearly 2,000 acres close to the Hyatt Regency Lost Pines Resort and Spa. The project would cater to businesses, and, according to developer Jim Carpenter, would be a boon to the area's economy.

Residents say they are worried about airport noise, declining property values and losing the quiet rural setting that lured them to the area.

Bastrop County Judge Ronnie McDonald said county officials are weighing the pros and cons of the project, making sure it's not going to adversely affect the community, schools or residents.

"If all of those things hold up, this could be an important economic boost for Bastrop County," McDonald said. There is the possibility for businesses to locate close to the airport and for further development in the area, he said.

The airport has already received preliminary clearance from the Federal Aviation Administration, agency spokesman Roland Herwig said. The airport must also meet federal and state environmental standards.

The FAA is the main federal permitting authority, and officials at the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality say they have not yet had contact with airport developers.

According to Carpenter, construction for the privately funded Central Texas Airport, as it has been called, could begin by the end of the year, and it might open as soon as 2010.

However, Carpenter still needs legislative approval for his plan to finance the project, which would require the agreement of local officials, and the session is already past its midpoint.

Carpenter declined to disclose the cost of the project. But an airport with one asphalt runway that could accommodate small jets with one ramp to park the aircraft would cost about $20 million, according to Bill Gunn, planning director for the Texas Department of Transportation aviation division.

Region 'under-airported'

The airport would join at least seven others around Austin-Bergstrom International Airport, Gunn said. There is room for another airport and a need from a business-aviation standpoint, he said.

"Austin is woefully under-airported," Gunn said.

Houston has about 18 airports, and Dallas-Fort Worth has about 25. Although Austin ought to have at least a half-dozen general aviation (everything but military and commercial) airports designated to relieve congestion at Austin-Bergstrom, Gunn said, there are only two — San Marcos and Georgetown.

Carpenter said he thinks the Central Texas Airport would be a "major economic generator for the region," a project that would create at least 11,000 new jobs, including at businesses on the land around the airport.

Carpenter said he hopes to attract businesses to Central Texas, such as aviation repair, aircraft charter leasing and sales, and medical support services, such as air ambulances and air taxis.

He said the airport would accommodate about 120 to 130 aircraft, including helicopters and corporate business jets.

Jim Craig, manager of Bird's Nest airport north of Manor, which will serve recreational and corporate pilots after renovation, said of the Bastrop project, "The more airports the better."

Scott Gallagher, airport manager at San Marcos Municipal Airport, said that right now, general aviation is suffering because of the struggling economy. "I would say it's a risky proposition to build an airport right now," Gallagher said. "Time will tell."

The project that didn't fly

This isn't Carpenter's first airport-related project. In the 1980s, Carpenter, his father, Charles Carpenter, and investors began acquiring thousands of acres of land in the Manor area, which was considered for a new municipal airport.

But in 1985, Austin voters turned down the new airport in a nonbinding referendum, and the city's attention turned toward the Bergstrom Air Force Base, which was selected as the new airport site in 1991.

Carpenter Development Co. filed for bankruptcy protection in July 1990. Jim Carpenter filed for personal bankruptcy in August 1992.

Carpenter said he and his company filed for bankruptcy protection after the City of Austin in 1984 approached him about relocating its municipal airport to Manor but then froze the development and land values through its negotiations and condemnation actions over a seven-year period. He and the company also were affected by the savings and loan crisis, he said.

In recent years, Carpenter has continued to show an interest in eastern Travis County. He offered the Village of Webberville more than $20 million to buy a 2,800-acre tract from the City of Austin to prevent the city from building a landfill near the village's border and near Villa Muse, a now-defunct proposed movie studio and housing development of which Carpenter & Associates Inc. was a partner.

The developer also was involved in 111 Congress Ave., which marks the downtown Austin skyline with its stair-step design and neon blue horizontal lines.

As far as the Bastrop project goes, Carpenter said flight and departure patterns were changed to accommodate the local community. In response to residents' concerns about noise, Carpenter said the airport would restrict the types of aircraft allowed, how much noise an aircraft could make and how it uses the runway.

But Chad Martin, the homeowners association president of The Forest At Colorado Crossing, which is southwest and across the Colorado River from the proposed airport site, said: "No matter what they say about engines, you're still going to have the noise."

Political wrangling

Bastrop City Manager Mike Talbot said at Tuesday's City Council meeting that the airport falls under the city's purview. Carpenter & Associates wants to create a municipal utility district in order to finance the project, and the state Legislature must reach an agreement with the city before a utility district is created, according to Talbot.

Bastrop city officials took no action on the airport and said they need to learn more about the project before doing so.

A bill is being drafted that would add the proposed airport site to Bastrop County, allow roads to be built and the airport to operate, according to Lisa Craven, chief of staff for state Sen. Glenn Hegar, R-Katy. But she said the bill won't be filed unless local officials and the community support the project.

Even the business community is taking a wait-and-see approach to the airport proposal.

The city's economic development corporation said not enough was known about the project to give pros and cons, and the Hyatt Lost Pines would only issue an e-mail statement, in which Steve Dewire, general manager, said : "The Resort is taking a neutral stance on the airport project, pending the receipt of sufficient information to determine whether or not noise pollution and safety issues have been appropriately addressed in the design and operation of the proposed airport, both short term and long term."

sgonzales@statesman.com; 445-3616

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