Spokane International Airport representatives say this month marks the start of four construction projects, including routine runway and taxiway maintenance, two new parking lot expansions, and tenant improvements with a total cost of nearly $24.1 million.

In the largest of the projects, the airport plans improvements to the 8,200-foot-long, east-west aligned Runway 7-25 and its parallel Taxiway C.

“This type of project is a general safety and standards airfield project,” says Larry Krauter, Spokane International Airport CEO. “These projects are designed to enhance safety and ensure runways meet with current (Federal Aviation Administration) standards.”

Lisa Corcoran, project manager with the airport’s planning and engineering department, says the $16 million project was awarded to Spokane-based Shamrock Paving Co. Florida-based RS&H Inc. designed the project and is serving as the construction manager under a $1.1 million contract. 

“This project includes shoulder grading, lighting, drainage improvements, and magnetic variations changes to Runway 7-25,” she says. “Those would include routine alignment changes to the runway due to the movement of magnetic north.”

 Work is scheduled to start this week and to be completed by October. 

In another project, record breaking passenger traffic has resulted in parking demand exceeding capacity, prompting the design of a new expanded economy parking lot on the airport’s northwest side. 

The new lot will be located within a 12-acre open area between in-bound Airport Drive and west McFarlane Road. The site lies directly south of the cell phone waiting lot, and across Flint Road to the west of the current Economy lot.

“The need for this project is due to growth of the airport,” says Krauter.p “We’ve found ourselves, especially in peak travel periods, running out of parking capacity.”

The $6.4 million project, awarded to Spokane Valley contactor N.A. Degerstrom Inc., is expected to add about 1,300 additional stalls to the Airport’s parking lot capacity. 

He says construction started July 5 and is expected to be completed by October.

Matt Breen, Spokane Airport’s director of planning and engineering, says the airport began work on another pavement improvement and parking lot project earlier this month on the airport’s south side, a $508,000 contract awarded to Red Diamond Construction Inc., of Spokane Valley, which is expected to be finished by mid-September. 

“This project consists of work at two separate locations; pavement rehabilitation at Building 43, located on the corner of Electric Avenue and Geiger Boulevard, and the creation of a new small parking lot in close proximity to International Aerospace Coating’s paint hangar just off Electric Avenue,” he says. 

Breen says Building 43’s current tenant is Enterprise Rent-a-Car, which has leased the building and parking areas since May 2011.

“The Building 43 lot improvements will make up a majority of the work on this project including; removal and replacement of asphalt pavement, crack sealing, and surface treatment,” he says.

Krauter says increased traffic also has prompted the airport to begin the process of moving its designated smoking area.

“As we’ve grown, we’ve begun to see more pedestrian traffic in the smoking area, and it’s become overly congested as people attempt to move through on their way to access the terminal building,” he says. “So, we decided to move it to a new location outside of the standard walkways.”

He says the $108,000 relocation project was awarded to California-based Engineering Remediation Resources Group Inc.

The new smoking area will be located to the south of the main terminal sky bridge, between the hourly parking lot and the main terminal building.

The current smoking area is located across from the main terminal building, just north of its sky bridge.

Krauter says the newly designed smoking area will include a new shelter, a concrete pad, a sidewalk, and landscaping.