A new plan to upgrade and renovate parts of the airport have been released.

TULSA – The Tulsa Airports Improvement Trust approved a $113.6 million, five-year capital improvement plan on Thursday.

The final plan will go to the Federal Aviation Administration this month. A draft CIP was presented for discussion with members of the FAA and airport tenants in January.

The CIP is the first step in the FAA’s grant application process, said Jeff Hough, Tulsa International Airport deputy director of engineering and facilities.

The federal government takes TIA’s information and uses it to begin an internal evaluation that prioritizes projects and determines which ones to fund, Hough said. Generally, the FAA staff in Fort Worth, Texas, collects information from all airports in the five-state region: Oklahoma, Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana and New Mexico. The FAA sorts through these plans from April through June and will submit recommendations to its headquarters for evaluation and funding decisions.

Among the 23 projects is a $22 million design and reconstruction project of Taxiway J at TIA. The taxiway carries traffic off the commercial air carrier runway.

The project will be split into two parts, Hough said.

“The FAA cannot cough up that kind of money in one year; it is too much, so we will split this into two phases,” Hough said.
The cost will be between $11 million and $12 million per phase, he said.

“The project does lend itself into being split into two phases,” Hough said.

Splitting the Taxiway J reconstruction into two phases is expected to add another $1 million to the project, Hough said.

Also, TIA officials plan to spend $700,000 to demolish several cargo buildings in the southwest corner of the airport. The site clearing of dilapidated cargo buildings is necessary for redevelopment, according to the CIP.

The CIP calls for $150,000 on planning for a multimodal facility at the airport. The facility will interface between various forms of transportation: air, barges from the Tulsa Port of Catoosa, rail and highway, according to the CIP. Initial phases of the project include concept development, environmental studies, land acquisition and preliminary engineering work.

Tulsa has various forms of transportation available adjacent to TIA. The project takes advantage of those opportunities and would promote a variety of airport-related development, according to the CIP.

The trust also approved a six-month agreement with Kyle Smith, owner of Family Fun, for music service at the terminal. The service will allow people in the terminal to purchase songs at the rate of two for a dollar. The service will cost the airport $204 per month, said Alexis Higgins, deputy director of marketing. However, the airport will receive 40 percent of the revenue generated by the service. Currently, music is piped into the airport.

A device that resembles a jukebox will be set up in Concourse B. The service will launch next week, said Daniel Meier, air service development coordinator.

“Just waiting on the paperwork,” Meier said.

If the service is renewed, another device would be added in Concourse A following renovation. The $23 million renovation of Concourse A will take another 15 months and, once complete, will house operations for Delta, American and Allegiant airlines.

Jeff Smith, senior project manager for Flintco, which is managing the Concourse A renovation, presented three contracts for board approval.
A $168,736 contract was awarded to American Terrazzo for flooring of Concourse A. The contract amount was $34,771 below the engineer’s estimate of $203,507.

A $65,685 contract was awarded to Vale Painting Co. The amount was $21,932 below the engineer’s estimate. A $25,245 contract was awarded to Osiyo Metals LLC for decorative metal railings. The amount was $7,321 below the engineer’s estimate.

The trust also approved a $15,597 change order with Contech Inc. and will add the installation of a passenger boarding bridge foundation at Gate A-10. The installation will support an airline request to provide a second parking position capable of accommodating a wide-body aircraft. The change order represents 5.2 percent of the total $316,515 cost for the concrete portion of the Concourse A renovation.

In a related move, the trust approved a $27,116 change order that will move a passenger boarding bridge at Gate A-8 to Gate A-10 to accommodate a request to have a second parking position for a wide-body aircraft.

Once construction is complete at Concourse A, airlines will be able to use Gates A7 or Gate A9, depending on the jet bridge placement, or Gate A10. The gates will be renumbered following the renovation. Currently, the only gate capable of handling wide-body aircraft is Gate 25.

- http://journalrecord.com/2014/03/13/...lan-aerospace/