New Terminal Disappears, But Need for Improved Air Travel Doesn’t

So the new terminal project at Myrtle Beach International Airport is, for all intents and purposes, dead – finished off Thursday by the city Community Appearance Board’s unanimous vote to reject it. What now?

Amid the disappointment surrounding the process and its results, it is at least encouraging to see that several prominent business leaders remain eager and ready to press on, and continue addressing the remaining need to improve airline travel in this market.

From Brad Dean, president of the Myrtle Beach Area Chamber of Commerce: “As a community, we desperately need to grow the number of flights in our market, and we pledge to do so in coordination with the county and the city, regardless of whether we are flying into the current terminal, and expanded terminal or a new terminal.”

From Mickey McCamish, president of Myrtle Beach Golf Holiday: “At this point, I’m glad a decision has been made, and perhaps what needs to be done is go back to the basics and reassess the entire airport need. The project justification just wasn’t good enough … Right now our focus continues to be on the air service. The next step for us is to see the report from The Boyd Group (on costs to airlines – more on that later). If we attract the affordable air service, that would be the key more than anything.”

From the peanut gallery: As we move forward, I just have a few requests of some of the principals who’ve been involved in this process:

To County Council - Even though the CAB has, as The Sun News indicated in today’s edition, “poo-poohed studies and experts the county trotted out to back up its arguments” for a new terminal, please don’t do the same to the studies and experts now being jointly commissioned by the Chamber and Golf Holiday. They, along with many local business experts, have long suspected that high airport fees have been a major factor in many airlines’ unwillingness to serve this market, and have since enlisted recognized aviation consultant The Boyd Group to conduct a study on the issue and, in turn, offer suggestions for a strategy to attract and keep air service.

The study is preliminarily scheduled to be complete by the end of May. If at that time its results back up these business leaders’ claims, County Council would be well-advised to reevaluate its ongoing reluctance to lower the fees. They no longer have the financial needs of a new terminal as an excuse.

To state lawmakers - You were prepared to allocate $15 million for a new airport terminal, citing the project’s importance to state tourism. With the city project now dead in the water, are you prepared to back up State Rep. Tracy Edge in his desire now to “jump-start a regional airport authority and approach it from that angle”?

By most accounts, any political leverage the county or city had to secure federal or state funding for future projects was dealt a crippling blow with Thursday’s developments. But while the prospects of a new city airport terminal have apparently disappeared, the need for improved air service to the state’s top tourism market hasn’t.

It’s time for Columbia to step up for this, and as Edge said yesterday, “there’s no sense in waiting any more.”

To the Community Appearance Board – In the end, you voted 7-0 to kill the project. In doing so, you cited the same basic objections you had when you first met with the county about the project in December 2006.

Tell us you wanted the new terminal to have a replica of the Trevi Fountain. Tell us you needed Siegfried & Roy performing out front year-round.

But please … DON’T tell us that it was necessary to drag this process out for four additional months – at an added cost to the county of $300,000, and to the city of 219 man-hours from its staff engineers – because, as CAB Chairman Larry Bragg explained to The Sun News, “he did not know which way his fellow board members would vote.”