The Raleigh-Durham airport in North Carolina (RDU) is apparently, far more forward thinking than most. Their ex-corporate CEO-headed Authority hired a glitzy promotional team to draw up a 25-year expansion plan that proposes to take nearly all of the unoccupied land around the airport (previously referred to as “buffer”) and lease it out to land developers in order to have it converted into condominiums, commercial/industrial space, retail space and parking lots. https://vision2040.rdu.com/
There are a few significant problems with this plan. One of them is that the prime real estate that they have identified for this purpose is a very popular park that is right in the middle of the area called Lake Crabtree County Park. It has the most popular and well maintained bike trails in the Triangle Region, along with trails for dog walkers and nature lovers. Adjacent to this park is another large swath of land that is also very popular with mountain bikers and has been for decades. However, it has never been sanctioned for that purpose.
Thousands of local voices have been raised against this wasteful and short sighted concept, to which the airport authority responds by saying “What? We can’t hear you!” followed by “funding for expansion!” Business Analysts have reviewed this plan and quickly point out that leasing runway-adjacent land to businesses is very unlikely to succeed. Land developers prefer to purchase their properties outright rather than risk having the lease on their investment suddenly revoked (as they are threatening to do with the park). There is plently of available property around the Triangle region more suitable for these purposes than cozying up to the (apparently, rapidly expanding) airport.
Pro Tip: Don’t put corporate flacks with visions of turning buffer space into high profit empires in charge of your airport property unless you want to throw away the amenities that make your region worth flying into. People who worship dollar signs above all else have no interest in seeing anything else of value.
