When the Virginia Air National Guard left its longtime home at Richmond International Airport in 2007, it was the end of an era.
As chronicled by the Richmond Times-Dispatch a decade ago, the last F-16 fighter screamed down the runway on a Sunday in September on its way to a new home, the result of the federal 2005 Base Realignment and Closure Commission and marking the last day of a 60-year residence for the unit. Nearly 300 full-time jobs went with it to what is now Joint Base Langley-Eustis in Hampton Roads.
But with that loss came a big silver lining: The airport now had a nearly 140-acre site, which the Guard had been leasing for just $1 a year, to open for development.
“A piece of history left, but it’s turned into economic opportunities for us that we’re turning into new jobs and new tenants that will feed the economy,” said Jon Mathiasen, president and CEO of the airport.
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Though success and growth at the airport is often examined through the lens of passenger airline service, new destinations and new carriers, growth in cargo service and general aviation — corporate and private jets — can provide a big boost to the bottom line.
“The east side also will bring us new and additional revenues that help us maintain the rate structure here at the airport, specifically for commercial aviation,” Mathiasen said. “Right now, our cost per passenger to the airlines is one of the more reasonable ones throughout the country, and we want to maintain that.”
The former National Guard site is part of 250 acres suitable for development on the east side of the airport, Mathiasen said, and the airport has spent the past six years laying the groundwork to make it attractive to aeronautical businesses such as maintenance and parts shops, cargo carriers and corporate tenants.
That includes adding an access road, utilities and a full-length taxiway.
“It will be a lot easier for the economic development agencies ... to lure a prospect to the airport,” Mathiasen said. “Instead of one large company, I would like to see four or five large companies, ranging from manufacturing to aircraft repair. ... If one happened to go out of business, it wouldn’t be a large blip on the screen for the airport or the surrounding community.”
In 2009, the FBI leased 8 acres and several hangars and other facilities at the airport, to the tune of about $1 million a year, for a quick reaction aviation unit. On a recent tour of the east side of the airport, one of the massive, all-white FBI jets taxied for a take-off.
The FBI unit conducts aviation operations for the agency’s Critical Incident Response Group, which “consists of a cadre of special agents and professional support personnel who provide expertise in crisis management, hostage rescue, surveillance and aviation, hazardous devices mitigation, crisis negotiations, behavioral analysis and tactical operations,” the FBI says, though it has historically been tight-lipped about its operations at the airport.
Nearby, the airport finished a new snow removal equipment building in late 2015 at a cost of about $7.5 million.
And more projects lie ahead.
Dominion Energy plans to build a new corporate hangar on the east side of the airport. A request for proposals will be issued a few years down the road for new facilities for Million Air, Aero Industries and Richmond Jet Center, so-called fixed-base operators that offer private jet charters, maintenance, aircraft storage and other services.
And the airport soon expects to announce a significant expansion of one of its cargo carriers.
DHL, FedEx and UPS all operate at the airport, and cargo volumes have surged over the past five years, from 93.2 million pounds in 2011 to 134.5 million tons in 2016.
