FORT WAYNE – Fort Wayne International Airport will spend $4.4 million in mostly federal money on a road project to help keep heavy machinery away from airplanes.
The Fort Wayne-Allen County Airport Authority on Thursday awarded the construction contract for the airport’s northwest perimeter road to Primco Inc. for $4.4 million.
The award is contingent on receiving a federal grant that will cover 95 percent of the costs, said Tory Richardson, airport executive director. He said he expects the airport to receive the grant.
Richardson said the road is needed to meet federal safety requirements to reduce the need to have vehicles sitting on aircraft runways and taxiways. That includes fuel vehicles and those used to plow the runways of snow. The road is not used by the general public, Richardson said.
The construction will follow a temporary road installed years ago that loops around Runway 14-32. The existing road is not built to handle heavy machinery, Richardson said. It’s about a mile long.
Richardson said construction will likely take one season and could be completed by late this year, depending on weather and when the federal grant is approved.
