Cedar Rapids airport gets $6.1 million federal grant

The Cedar Rapids Airport Commission has been awarded a $6.1 million grant by the U.S. Department of Transportation to partially fund a four-year passenger terminal modernization project at The Eastern Iowa Airport.

The entitlement grant will be issued as a multiyear grant with $3,337,391 in fiscal 2014 funding. The remaining $2,714,099 of the entitlement will be added by amendment subject to future appropriations through fiscal 2015.

Airport Director Tim Bradshaw said work has begun on the first phase of the $47 million terminal project. Bradshaw said funding for the construction will come from several sources.

'This will be the first of hopefully additional federal funding as we go through this four-year program,” Bradshaw said. 'We also will be using some state grant funding as well as passenger facility charge revenue,

'We are not bonding for this and there will be not debt. There are no tax dollars involved and we will not be increasing the rent for the airlines.”

The airport just recorded a seventh consecutive month of record passenger traffic. Bradshaw said the airport commission on Friday approved the purchase of a new passenger boarding bridge for installation in the lower B concourse.

'We had planned to purchase the boarding bridge when we renovate and expand the B concourse in 2016, but we are having constraints,” Bradshaw said. 'The commission agreed to buy it two years early, and we plan to install it and have it operating before the holiday travel period begins.”

Bradshaw said a 'switchback” ramp will be constructed in the B concourse to bring passengers up to the level of the boarding bridge.