Airport prepares for parking expansion, lot resurfacing

By Scott Aust, Journal staff | Monday, June 09, 2008

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The Rapid City Regional Airport plans to add more than 150 new parking spaces and resurface parts of existing parking areas.

Cameron Humphres, airport deputy director, said the airport needs additional spaces during peak periods. At times, the current lots are so full that some people have had to park on the grass in the long-term lot.

"As Rapid City Regional Airport grows, so does the need for parking," he said. "We're going to expand both the long-term and short-term parking areas, and once that is completed, we'll do some resurfacing inside the existing parking lot."

Humphres said he doesn't know how much the project will cost, but the airport has gone out to bid for the project, which will add 153 parking spaces and about 80,000 square feet of parking lot. The project may start in August or September.

Holidays and the summer months are usually the busiest times of year for the airport, Humphres said.

"Between Memorial Day and Labor Day are usually pretty high times," he said. "We're also seeing some weekly high times because of our Allegiant flights to Las Vegas. We have the twice-a-week flights, and because of that, people are parking in long-term parking and really taking advantage of that."

The Sturgis motorcycle rally usually brings an increase in inbound traffic, but the impact on parking usually is more from people who have had their motorcycles trucked in and need a place to park those trailers, he said.

Humphres said the airport will pay for the expansion, while Standard Parking will pay for the resurfacing. Standard is the company that manages the parking system at the airport and shares revenue with the airport from parking fees. Doing a joint project instead of separate projects will likely help reduce mobilization fees.

Part of the expansion project will include additional outbound lanes for people leaving the paid parking areas. The lanes will accept credit cards and move vehicles through more quickly.

"There are times when there are some significant wait times, and they're going to try to address them with additional outbound lanes and additional staff, I believe," Humphres said.

Contact Scott Aust at 394-8415 or scott.aust@rapidcityjournal.com.