SIOUX CITY - There are plenty of changes at a brighter, modernized version of Sioux Gateway Airport these days thanks to a $5.5 million renovation, but officials say some of the most dramatic improvements are hidden from public view.
The “hidden” changes are to the Sioux City airport’s infrastructure in the basement, where officials say workers cleared out a labyrinth of old wires and ancient pipes from renovations past. In their place are a row of new boilers and gleaming new air-handling units replaced the outdated
Curt Miller, Sioux City’s airport/transit/fleet director said the behind-the-scenes improvements will result in less maintenance, lower utility bills and fewer breakdowns at the facility originally built in the 1940s. That was the part of the building that needed attention the most, he said.
“A lot of the infrastructure in this building dates back to the ’50s,” Miller said.
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Other renovations include improvements to the baggage claim, replacement of termite-damaged walls and a new luggage-handling and scanning system.
Federal funds paid for approximately 95 percent of the project, Miller said, which will be supplemented with approximately $700,000 to $800,000 in local funds. Of that, about $3.96 million came from federal stimulus funds.
In addition to providing passengers with better service, Miller said the renovations also better position the airport to lure in a second carrier to join Delta Airlines, the only commercial airline to provide service to Sioux City since Frontier pulled out in 2008.
“The intent is to get a second service in here to get more competition,” Miller said.
Although most of the project is complete, Miller said it would take over a month to finish outside work on the canopy in front of the building.
The project started two years ago and originally called for about $300,000 in local funds, but Miller said the work got more expensive when officials discovered water was pooling underneath building in the baggage claim area. The airport also received a $626,000 federal grant for a new passenger loading bridge connecting the terminal to the planes. The new bridge is adjustable and allows the airport to service smaller aircraft and more than one plane at a time, Miller said.
Passengers whose planes arrive at Sioux Gateway will be greeted to a new luggage carousel in the baggage claim area. Its most notable feature is that, unlike the old carousel, the new one doesn’t require people to vault over the moving beltway to chase errant luggage.
Passengers boarding flights at the Sioux City airport will soon be greeted by a new luggage-transfer system that allows them to give their bags to the ticket agents. The agents will be able to place the luggage onto a conveyer belt behind the ticket counter which will transfer the luggage to a new x-ray machine in a separate room. Once the items are scanned, the belt system will transfer the luggage to another area where it will be put onto vehicles for transport to the cargo hold of the planes.
It will be a big change from the old system, Miller said, where TSA agents searched bags on tables in the lobby.
“All that’s now behind the scenes,” Miller said.
Passengers also probably won’t notice the extensive repair work crews did on the structure of the building, but officials say the many new walls aren’t just to spruce the place up.
The building was held together by a steel structure, but in places termites had eaten their way through much of the wood in between the framing. Though the bugs had long been exterminated, the damage had to be fixed and the remnants of their handiwork removed.
