Transportation Secretary Buttigieg hails airport improvements in Cedar Rapids stop

The federal bipartisan infrastructure bill that’s providing more than $20 million to the Eastern Iowa Airport’s ongoing terminal improvement project represents the Biden administration commitment to addressing infrastructure improvement needs that have been ignored for decades, federal Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg told local leaders and airport officials Thursday. After touring progress on the final, $68 million phase of the airport’s four-phase modernization project, which will add four new gates to the airport's concourse as well as a host of traveler amenities, Mr. Buttigieg spoke on the airport’s tarmac as work on the project continued behind him. Highlighting the $25 billion allocated in the 2021 infrastructure bill for airport improvement projects, Mr. Buttigieg said the nation’s infrastructure efforts have been lagging in the decades since a federal transportation secretary stopped in Cedar Rapids – Elizabeth Dole's visit in 1986. “We are located on Wright Brothers Boulevard, which I think is a really apt reminder that America is the country that ushered in the aviation age, and the Midwest was the cradle of a lot of that innovation,” he said. “It's appropriate, then, that Americans ought to have the best air travel in the world. But we've been slipping as a country with decades of underinvestment. We have been needing (to do more) since the 1980s, whether it's our airports, our roads and bridges, our transit and rail and ports. And thanks to President Biden and the bipartisan leaders from both sides, we’ve now gotten this done.” The FAA announced in February that 99 airport nationwide would receive a total of nearly $1 billion in infrastructure funds, and Mr. Buttigieg praised the efforts of local leaders in landing a portion of those federal funds for the Eastern Iowa Airport. “These are still extremely competitive programs,” Mr. Buttigieg said. “In the last couple of (funding) rounds, we got between $10 and $15 of requests for every $1 we were able to actually say yes to, so it really does reflect very well on your planning process that you were successful in (getting) this grant.” Mr. Buttigieg added that the infrastructure bill will bring an estimated $93 million to Iowa to improve the state’s transportation infrastructure here more resilient against flooding and extreme weather, which is “something that I need not tell Cedar Rapids about the importance.” “In so many ways, transportation is essential to the quality of life and economic strength and safety that we all depend on,” he said, “and improvements to transportation improve our access to all of those things that make our lives meaningful.”

Sand praises lawmakers who voted for bill

State auditor Rob Sand attended Thursday’s event, noting that he was glad to have “an opportunity to come and hear about the impact this is going to have for Cedar Rapids and for Eastern Iowa. It’s incredibly important because when you are in a rural state like Iowa, your airports are your lifelines. Your airports are your connections to everywhere else. Everything that is coming and going from your state oftentimes is coming through an airport, and when you've got just a handful of them in your state, everything that's happening at every single one of them is important to the entire state.” Mr. Sand also thanked former Congresswoman Cindy Axne and Sen. Chuck Grassley, the only two members of Iowa’s congressional delegation to vote for the infrastructure bill. “Kudos to the two of them for looking at this package, understanding how great the need in the United States was for infrastructure spending and making the investment,” he said. “That's a little bit harder for Senator Grassley, because he was working with a Democratic president and obviously there's pressure to go against that. Again, he's the only member of Iowa's federal delegation that was a Republican to vote for the bill. Good for Chuck Grassley, good for Iowa.”

O’Donnell highlights city’s aviation history

In her remarks Thursday, Cedar Rapids mayor Tiffany O’Donnell noted the city’s extensive aviation history, from the Wright Brothers, “who happened to pioneer flight and at one point called Cedar Rapids home” to the “communications systems developed here in Cedar Rapids that connected our NASA engineers with the Apollo 11 astronauts on their historic lunar mission, all out of that little place called Collins Aerospace.” She also said the airport modernization project is a part of a larger development explosion in the city’s “southwest growth area," where businesses have invested more than $1 billion, creating more than 1,000 new jobs and retaining 2200 retain others. “Active projects in this area represent a potential in our state for $1.2 billion in economic development,” she said. “New large warehouse and distribution facilities are leveraging connections to I-380, our nation's rail system and of course, right here at the Eastern Iowa Airport. From its humble beginnings 75 years ago, with a farmhouse serving as its great terminal, our airport has evolved today into a facility that we can all take pride in. Cedar Rapids’ economic strength relies heavily on this airport. The significant investment that we mark today will not only benefit the passengers, but also contribute to the flourishing commerce and workforce development of our city.”

Smith, Lenss point to overall project, contribution to local jobs

Duane Smith, chair of the Cedar Rapids Airport Commission, said said the $122 million, four-phase modernization project, which will conclude when the final phase wraps up in the next 18 to 24 months, has received “many compliments on air quality and other facilities transformation, for the image we portray.” He also said he was pleased the federal funds, along with a $28 million grant from the Iowa Department of Transportation’s Iowa Commercial Aviation Infrastructure Fund (ICAIF), are providing an estimated 450 jobs for local workers, including Rinderknecht Associates Inc., the project’s general contractor. In brief comments, airport director Marty Lenss highlighted the airport’s improvements over the years. “In 1986, we cut the ribbon on a state-of-the-art, 94,000-square-foot modern terminal,” he said. “When we finish this project, we will be at 240,000 square feet, just 40 years later.”

Tower Terrace Road extension project still awaits federal funds A project that would extend Tower Terrace Road on the northern side of the metro area from Interstate 380 to Highway 13 was denied $25 million in federal funding in the most recent $2.2 billion federal appropriation – the third year in a row that a funding funding for the project has been rejected. In response to a reporter’s question on that decision, Mr. Buttigieg said applicants who are denied funding are given feedback on how to improve their applications in future years, and that many projects wait several years to receive approval. “At the same time, I want to be transparent about just how competitive these programs are,” he said. “It’s been since the Eisenhower administration that we were putting this level of funding into roads, bridges, transit, you name it. What that means is a lot of needs have built up over the years, and we're not going to be able to do it all in one year, or even in five. But over the five year life of this bill, we're going to be doing more than ever before, and I'm excited to be able to say yes more than we've ever been able to do, at least in my lifetime.” A separate project that’s adding a new I-380 diverging diamond interchange at Tower Terrace Road is being funded by local and state dollars. That $22 million project is set for completion in the next few months.