The city’s Board of Aviation Commissioners have approved seeking bids for a new set of aircraft hangars.
The board hopes to build a large unit with seven individual spaces that will be located on the northeast corner of Andrews Street, north of Arnold Street.
The City Plan Commission approved the board’s request to rezone five acres, located at the northeast corner of Arnold and Andrew Streets, to be used as public or semi-public facilities — in this case, for the potential purpose of building these new hangars on the north end of the five acres.
The hangars will be leased to plane owners to house one single engine aircraft per space. The municipal airport on the North side of Columbus currently owns 32 individual spaces for aircraft, all of which are filled.
Airport director Brian Payne said that the board aims to have bids back by July 14 in preparation for the Columbus Redevelopment Commission’s July 20 meeting where assistance with utilities and pavement will be requested.
Once the bids are in, the board will have a better estimate of the cost of renting these hangars and will likely send out a survey to see if tenants are interested in renting such units.
“Our goal would be these units rented before we ever went to construction,” Payne said.
Payne described the new units as looking similar to the current condo hanger units but much smaller in scale. The airport currently owns six condo hangars; all but one is rented. The remaining unit is being used to house snow removal equipment until a new maintenance storage unit is constructed.
“Each unit is 42 feet wide by 33 feet deep, which is big enough to house any single engine craft,” he said. He added that there would also be a 12-foot tall opening across, a restroom, a flight planning area, a 12 by 12 roll-up door, a man door on the land side and a man-door-only on the air side. He also said that the board has proposed a parking lot that will be twice the size of what they need, in order to allow additional people to park.
“The asphalt parking lot and drive, as well as the utilities that will take, should be able to be covered under our TIF district,” Payne said. “And we will have to go to the redevelopment commission and request those funds to assist us with that. But the building, the building and the proposed ramp space, will be a separate contract.”
Payne said the airport recognizes the need for larger industrial or commercial users to have hangar space.
“So we do have three larger units expected to be 150 by 150 (feet) in here, a proposed auto parking area, another row of condo hangars, if need exists at that time, and then these smaller condo units. … This auto parking would still be utilized for phase two of the project. We’ll bring in another road in on this eastern side.”
