Committee studies future of Palmdale Regional Airport

The testimony came during the first meeting of the Select committee on Long-Term Planning for Commercial and General Aviation Airport Capacity. The committee is chaired by Assemblyman Scott Wildman, D-Burbank. Assemblyman George Runner, R-Lancaster, is also on the committee.

No one spoke against expansion of the airport, which sits on 62 acres of leased land at Air Force Plant 42 in Palmdale. Air service from a terminal there has been offered on and off for decades.

The airport has no passenger service now, since the most recent carrier, United Express, left in April of 1998. Company officials said they could not make a profit in Palmdale.

Palmdale Mayor Jim Ledford said the airport is the most viable in Southern California for future growth. "Our capacity today is greater than Ontario if we could realize it," Ledford said.

Los Angeles World Airports, which runs Palmdale Regional Airport, can run up to 50 flights daily in and out of Air Force Plant 42, and a stipulation in the contract allows up to 400 flights daily.

But, said Col. Robert "Bob" Catlin, commander of Air Force Plant 42, environmental review will be needed if Los Angeles World Airports wants to run more than 50 flights a day from his airfield.

Larry Chimbole, former Palmdale mayor, a former state assemblyman and a current member of the Palmdale Airport Commission, said it's time Los Angeles World Airports moves forward with its 30-year-old plan to build the Palmdale International Airport, an altogether separate facility with runways and a terminal of its own.

Hopes for such a facility by airport boosters have dimmed over more than three decades.

On the premise of easing pressure on Los Angeles International Airport, the city of Los Angeles bought 17,000 acres of desert east of Air Force Plant 42 in 1969. Construction of the new airport was expected "at any time," Chimbole said. It never happened.

Further hampering any efforts Los Angeles may have of building the Intercontinental Airport is its current lease with the Air Force. That document says construction on a new airport can't begin until Los Angeles World Airports is making 400 flights a day from Plant 42. The agreement expires in 2014.

Wildman, who moderated the afternoon discussion, said the first logical step to any sort of growth at Palmdale Regional Airport is to find a carrier or two to run the 50 daily flights already allowed.

Carol Seidle, Palmdale's deputy city manager, said the city is trying to help Los Angeles World Airports bring a carrier to town, but that ultimately, it is not the city's responsibility to do so.

David Myers, a transportation expert and a Palmdale City Councilman, said Los Angeles World Airports hired a business development manager specifically for the Palmdale airport last year, but no willing carrier has been found.