By Angela Brown

City hoping province will help with airport upgrades

Mar 22, 2018 | 2:00 PM

North Battleford City Hall hopes to continue with plans to make runway upgrades at the Cameron McIntosh Airport, and is hoping the province will kick in some cash to do so.

Mayor Ryan Bater said the city is waiting for the provincial budget to be released April 10 to find out if the province will be extending the Community Airport Partnership (CAP) program again this year to provide partial funding for the 2018 project.

“If they do, we intend to use it for the continued rehabilitation of the runway at the Cameron McIntosh Airport,” said Bater.    

Council already gave its approval for the city to apply for the grant application through the province for the pavement rehabilitation for the runway.

The mayor said the upgrade is part of the ongoing work the city’s done over the last several years to rehabilitate the runway at the local airport.

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He said the airport is “an important asset for the city.”

“We’ve been able to access funding under the CAP program – a grant program available through the province that provides a cost share to the city to get the work done,” the mayor said.

Bater said the issue was brought forward when the city was developing its 2018 budget.

Council approved the resolution for the city to request grant funding under the CAP program from the province to rehabilitate a portion of the runway at the airport for the maximum-allowable cost-shared amount of $275,000, with the understanding the city would contribute at least 50 per cent of the total cost of the project, which is estimated to be $550,000. 

The city wants to work on the airport runway upgrade work again this year.

“We hope to do the work this summer,” said Bater. “We’ve done it the last couple of years, and we just want to continue that work. We’ve paved the middle portion of the runway, and this will start to address the shoulder, the sides of the runway.”

“It’s been a priority for the province as well,” added the mayor. “It’s a good example of the cooperation between our two levels of government. I hope that it continues. It’s a good program.”

Last year, for a project to rehabilitate part of the centre portion of the runway, through the CAP program, the province provided $275,000 or 33 per cent of the cost – the maximum the ministry can contribute for the program – while the City of North Battleford contributed $550,000 through the city’s capital program (67 per cent of the project cost), for a total estimated $825,000 project.

The runway upgrade work has been part of a multi-year process. 

According to the city, in 2016 and 2017 the centre section of the main runway was partially resurfaced through the CAP program. The restoration of the main runway is planned to be completed over four years at a total estimated cost of $2,073,000.

City administration is proposing to complete the work over the next two years, doing a portion of the work each year under the CAP grant program. Years one (2016) and two (2017) have resulted in resurfacing a 27-metre wide centre-section of the runway’s entire 1,340-metre length; years three and four would complete the outside 9-metres on each side of the centre section, which would completely restore the runway.

 angela.brown@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @battlefordsNOW