Northwest Florida Regional Airport

Northwest Florida Regional Airport
Northwest Florida Regional Airport; Eglin Air Force Base
	USGS aerial photo as of 15 February 1999
IATA: VPS – ICAO: KVPS – FAA LID: VPS VPS Location of the Airport in Florida
Summary
Airport type	Public / Military
Owner/Operator	United States Air Force
Serves	Fort Walton Beach, Destin
Location	Valparaiso, Florida
Elevation AMSL	87 ft / 27 m
Coordinates	30°29′00″N 086°31′31″W / 30.48333°N 86.52528°W
Website	www.FlyVPS.com
Runways
Statistics (2006)
Aircraft operations	126,060
	Source: Federal Aviation Administration

Northwest Florida Regional Airport (IATA: VPS, ICAO: KVPS, FAA LID: VPS) is an airport located within Eglin Air Force Base, near Valparaiso and Fort Walton Beach in Okaloosa County, Florida, United States. No private aircraft are permitted to leave out of or arrive at Northwest Florida Regional, so Destin-Fort Walton Beach Airport is used for non-commercial operations. The airport was formerly known as Okaloosa Regional Airport until its name was changed in September 2008.

Northwest Florida Regional Airport is served by six airlines providing non-stop service across the southern United States. In 2008, the FAA recorded over 373,808 enplanements at the airport.^[2]

History [edit]

1957: The Okaloosa County Air Terminal opened on Eglin Air Force Base in building 89 with 3 personnel (Airport Manager, Security and Admin Support. Southern Airways was the only air carrier. Passengers would enter the base through the East Gate adjacent to Valparaiso, thus the airport code of VPS was born.

1968: Southern Airways began flying four DC-9 aircraft daily out of VPS. Air New Orleans began operations with service to New Orleans.

The newly constructed James E. Plew Terminal Building of the Okaloosa Air Terminal, located on State Road 85, opened its doors in mid-February 1975, with a dedication ceremony held on Saturday, 22 February. Congressman Bob Sikes and Southern Airways President Frank Hulse were some of the guest speakers.^[3] The 32,000 sq ft (3,000 m2) facility was constructed at a cost of $1.7 million. Financing for the entire facility was through federal, state, and local money. Federal grants totaled $472,000, state $80,000, Okaloosa County bond sale $1.1 million, and Southern Airways $190,000. First year enplaned passengers totaled 97,000 with Southern Airways as the sole airline with 12 departing flights daily.

November 2004: The current Northwest Florida Regional Airport opened its doors following a major expansion program including additional public parking and aircraft parking apron, a second parallel taxiway, landscaping and a new 110,000 sq ft (10,000 m²) passenger terminal.

January 2008: Broke ground on the Consolidated Rental Car Service Facility located on 22 acres (89,000 m²) east of the airport. This facility will have offices for all 5 rental car companies as well as rental car service facilities with hydraulic lifts, automated car washes, gas pumps and vacuum islands and a consolidated fuel farm for both aviation and unleaded gasoline. A cargo facility and new offices for airport maintenance will also be built to the east of the terminal and are included in the project.

May 2009: Opened Consolidated Rental Car Service Facility on new 22-acre (89,000 m²) leasehold just east of the main terminal. This $14M project came in on time and under budget and was funded entirely with rental car user fees.

Facilities and aircraft [edit]

Gates at the Northwest Florida Regional Airport.

Northwest Florida Regional Airport and Eglin AFB share two runways: 12/30 with a 12,005 x 300 ft (3,659 x 91 m) asphalt/concrete surface and 1/19 with a 10,012 x 300 ft (3,052 x 91 m) asphalt pavement. For the 12-month period ending March 31, 2006, the airport had 126,060 aircraft operations, an average of 345 per day: 71% military, 19% scheduled commercial, 8% general aviation and 2% air taxi.^[1]

The airport has a 110,000 ft² airport passenger terminal building with three second-level gates with passenger jet ways and three ground-level commuter gates with regional jet boarding bridges

The passenger terminal at VPS is a two-level, 107,000 square foot facility as was opened in November 2004. The old terminal building was demolished soon after. The terminal provides areas for ticketing and baggage claim and upper and lower courses with gates to board aircraft. The first level has Gates A1, A2, and A3. Located here also are waiting areas and concessions. The second-level concourse has Gates B1, B2, and B3, and also has a restaurant and concession areas. The terminal was designed so that future expansion would be possible. According to the Northwest Florida Regional Airport Master Plan Update, a project to extend the concourse 120 feet and add three additional gates is under consideration (2010). Access to the terminal is provided via a designated entrance off of State Road 85.There are then three option when entering the airport loop. There are parking facilities to the left, access to the terminal or loop straight ahead, or access to the rental car return to the right. The airport loop road has two pass-through lanes on the left and three arrival-departure lanes in front of the terminal. The loop road is a two-lane asphalt roadway approximately ¾ mile in length. Short-term and long-term parking facilities are also available. The parking facilities underwent a major improvement program in the early 2000s as part of the new terminal expansion program. These facilities were designed with the Transportation Security Administration's "300-foot rule" in mind, and satisfy the 300-foot distance between parked vehicles and the terminal building. This reduces the need to extra security personnel.

Okaloosa County owns and operates the airport terminal, which sits on 131 acres of Eglin AFB property that is lease from the U.S. Department of the Air Force. The property is leased until 2031 and limits aircraft operations at 80 per day. It is unique in that the county staffs the airport, yet it leases the property from the USAF. Okaloosa County Commission serves as a policy board and hires the airport staff.

Greg Donovan, A.A.E. is VPS's Airport Director. Greg worked as the Operations Manager at Dane County Regional Airport in Madison, Wisconsin for 9 years prior to being appointed to this position in 2001. He has also worked for the Houston Airport System at Hobby Airport as an Airport Operations Aide (1992), a Management Intern at America West Airlines corporate headquarters in Phoenix, Arizona (1991) and as a Management Assistant with the Federal Aviation Administration at Orlando International Airport (1989). He earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Aviation Management from Florida Institute of Technology in 1991 and holds a private pilot's license. Donovan served as President of the Wisconsin Airport Management Association (WAMA) in 2001 and graduated from Leadership Pensacola in 2003. He currently chairs the Florida Airports Council (FAC) facilities committee and is an active member of the Continuing Florida Aviation Systems Planning Process (CFASPP) (Florida Airports Council Facilities & Information Technology Conference, 2006).

Airlines and destinations [edit]

Northwest Airlines parked at Northwest Florida Regional Airport

Airlines	Destinations
American Eagle	Dallas/Fort Worth
American Eagle operated by ExpressJet	Dallas/Fort Worth
Delta Air Lines	Atlanta
Delta Connection operated by ExpressJet	Atlanta
United Express operated by ExpressJet	Houston-Intercontinental
US Airways Express operated by Air Wisconsin	Charlotte, Washington-National
US Airways Express operated by PSA Airlines	Charlotte, Washington-National

Top Destinations [edit]

**Top ten busiest domestic routes out of VPS**
(July 2010 - June 2011) ^[4]
Rank	City	Passengers	Carriers
1	Atlanta, GA	165,000	Delta, Vision
2	Dallas-Fort Worth, TX	70,000	American
3	Charlotte, NC	48,000	US Airways
4	Memphis, TN	36,000	Delta
5	Houston-Intercontinental, TX	36,000	United
6	Louisville, KY	6,000	Vision
7	Little Rock, AR	4,000	Vision
8	Knoxville, TN	4,000	Vision
9	Orlando-Sanford, FL	4,000	-
10	St. Petersburg, FL	3,000	-