By LEONARD GRAY / L’Observateur / March 6, 1999

RESERVE – Louisiana should learn in about seven or eight months where a new major international airport will be located, somewhere between Baton Rouge and New Orleans.

The new airport, which would dwarf New Orleans International Airport, will be constructed and in operation sometime in the next seven years.

Glen Smith, chairman of the 6-year-old Louisiana Airport Authority, addressed a group of area business owners at the Port of South Louisiana’s Guest House, next to Globalplex, Tuesday night.

Smith said the Airport Authority is pushing the Federal Aviation Administration for funding a “world-class” airport, comparable to Dallas/Ft. Worth or Denver.”The west bank of the River Parishes is where it ought to be located,” Smith commented.

Cost of construction, Smith added, would be $1.07 billion. It wouldproduce 10,000 construction jobs plus 90,000 permanent direct and indirect jobs, and an annual economic impact of $8.4 billion to the state.”The numbers were just phenomenal,” Smith said.

As it’s officially known, the Louisiana Transportation Center and International Airport would be located on a 25,000-acre site with a 1- mile buffer zone around it. Ten thousand acres would be set aside for theairport alone, and the remainder would include manufacturing facilities and links to docks, interstate highways and high-speed rail lines.

“It’s rapidly becoming the most fantastic, dynamic project in Louisiana,” Smith told the group, while urging those in attendance to talk up the project to their business acquaintances and write letters of support which will be forwarded to the FAA.

The letters are in support of the Authority’s Airport Improvement Program grand application for funding of a site selection study and rail traffic study. A 1994 FAA study concluded the project was financially feasible.Already, the authority has on file supportive letters from nearly every parish and municipal government in southeast Louisiana.

“There’s a lot of excitement about this project,” Smith said.

The informal meeting also included a 10-minute video narrated by TV reporter Warren Bell, who stated: “The global economy demands the seamless integration of all our transportation means.”So far, a feasibility study has been completed and the project is entering what Smith called Phase Two, where a site will be selected and acquired.

The Louisiana Airport Authority includes representation from 13 parishes and includes St. Charles Parish Councilman Curtis Johnson Sr. and St.James Parish President Dale Hymel Jr., as well as Smith, a resident of St.John the Baptist Parish who was appointed by Gov. Foster as chairman.Smith was the chairman of St. John Parish’s economic developmentcommittee in 1990-91.

Smith said once the new airport is built, the facility would be overseen by the authority, which falls directly under the governor’s office, separate of other state departments.

Reasons to push the project are manifold, Smith noted, adding Sen. TrentLott of Mississippi is pushing an airport project to support the state’s Gulf Coast gaming industry. The Mississippi Gulf Coast and its casinos, hecontinued, have begun to rival New Orleans in attracting tourist dollars: in 1996, New Orleans pulled in $3.5 billion and the Gulf Coast, $2.9 billion.However, the landlocked New Orleans airport cannot expand further without serious concessions by either Kenner or St. Charles Parish, bothof which are blocking such efforts.

Foster is likewise pushing the new airport proposal in his efforts to diversify the state’s economy. In a September 1998 letter to the FAA,Foster wrote: “Louisiana is strategically situated to be a major force in the developing trade markets of Latin and South America. The FAA’scontinued investment in air transportation and services in Louisiana will pay great dividends for the entire country. A new multi-modaltransportation system coupled with other Louisiana airport services will serve as a hub in moving goods effectively and efficiently throughout this hemisphere.””The key thing is to get everyone involved,” Smith said. “It’s somethingwe just can’t miss out on.”He concluded: “It can and will happen; the only question is when it will happen.”

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