Take over AV airport

They need not have worried. I never for one minute believed that the Los Angeles Department of Airports would ever build on that 17,000 acres east of Palmdale. In my observation, that whole program was far more about money, power and politics than it ever was about transportation.

So when Supervisor Mike Antonovich opened the AV Business Outlook Conference with a suggestion that the Antelope Valley step up and take control of its own commercial airport destiny, I was delighted to lead in the applause.

Now, some of our leaders aren't sure we could pull that off. But I'm 100% certain we won't do it if we think small and never try. I'm almost 100% certain that we'll never have anything but a "neighborhood" airport if we leave its fate in the hands of the folks at One World Way in Los Angeles, who have every reason in the world to see their Palmdale operations remain an agricultural preserve.

Overcrowded, congested, builtout LAX is hell-bent on expansion where it is, and Hollywood-Burbank-Pasadena, etc. Airport is bursting at the seams with traffic and beset by opposition to expanding by as much as two airline gates.

And here - 40 minutes up the freeway from Burbank - sits the vastly underused Palmdale Regional Airport, operating off of two world class runways shared under a joint-use agreement with Air Force Plant 42.

So why isn't Palmdale's airport getting the commercial business?

All kinds of theories have been studied to death, but I think the bottom line is lack of committed leadership to develop and use the Antelope Valley's most important economic resources.

To overcome the obstacles to success, we first need to change the name of the product from Palmdale Regional Airport, which sounds like a place with a lot of Cessnas, to something airlines can understand and appreciate - something like North L.A. County International Airport. No travel or tour agent in Zurich is ever going to book an L.A.-bound traveler on a jet to Palmdale Regional, but North L.A. County International sounds close enough - especially if the fare to get there is competitive.

Which brings us to the real issue - money.

LAX is nothing if not aggressive in the fees it charges the airlines, which don't have a whole lot of choice about where to land in this county. And whatever happens, the high-volume, high-frequency scheduled carriers are still going to pay whatever LAX charges.

But there are a whole lot of foreign flag carriers and national and international charter operators whose margins might benefit greatly from deplaning a load of Japanese tourists in Palmdale for fees far below those at LAX.

The charter bus ride or rent-acar drive to an ultimate L.A. Basin destination might be a smidgeon longer from Palmdale, or not, depending on traffic. And while a 747 cargo container full of imports doesn't much care where it lands in L.A. County, the shipper and the cargo carrier do care about the costs.

A locally operated commercial airport in Palmdale, already in a foreign trade zone, is a natural reliever for both LAX and Burbank.

In a world where all the pressures on the airline industry descends directly to the bottom line, it makes great sense to offer air carriers an affordable alternative to the rich L.A. County market. We don't need all the airline business - just the overflow and the growth factor would provide handsome returns for the Antelope Valley.

So, let's let LAX keep its 17,000-acre carrot, onion and pistachio farm for now, as the county and the cities of Palmdale and Lancaster assume control of the viable airport already here.

Folks living in the beach cities around a soon-to-expand LAX should certainly have an interest in supporting our success, along with people in the cities around the cramped Burbank Airport.

But let's not wait too long to turn the key on our near turn-key commercial airport operations. Once LAX clears the political hurdles for its vaunted expansion plans, the Antelope Valley opportunity will have passed.