All right, I'll go ahead and call our April 13th.

April 13th, 2026.

Um, Columbia City Council work session to order.

Uh we have a couple of items on our agenda.

The main one is our airport master plan and just an update and discussion around that.

Um, and then the second is we have a bunch of different kind of like reorganizing of our own schedule of work sessions and things like that.

And so staff wanted to make sure to have a touch point with us to do that.

So without further ado, I'm assuming I'm kicking it over to the man of the hour, Mike Parks.

Well, good evening.

No pressure, no pressure.

All right, I got PowerPoint to work, I think.

So should be okay.

Uh I'm Mike Parks, airport manager.

I'm gonna have uh a few slides this evening, but generally uh happy to have a conversation about everything that's going on at the airport.

And just really want to start out with the our purpose statement.

I think was super important.

The airport's purpose is to provide a safe, reliable and efficient air transportation to support regional economic growth and a connectivity for residents in mid-Missouri.

We've done a lot uh over the years uh to make things better at the airport, but of course, the last year has probably grabbed more attention uh than it has in recent years.

So with that this evening, my intent is really to review the master plan.

I want to talk about the growth of the airport in transportation for passengers, talk about the history and then really what the outlook looks like, and uh and then also just the department structure and how we're currently staffed.

So I'm gonna jump into the uh master plan.

I I hope everybody had time to review the entire document since I gave it to you a week ago.

But yeah, exactly.

Exactly.

So it is a an extremely comprehensive plan.

Uh, and of course, we also put a link online to make it easy for everybody to have access to and to be able to look at.

But generally, it's to continue modernizing the Columbia Regional Airport to offer a safe and accessible facility connecting mid-Missouri to the world.

So the last master plan that we completed was in 2009.

Uh we generally had accomplished all the work in that master plan from 2009.

And so, really, the next steps were is a snapshot here about a year and a half ago when we began this master plan process was really a snapshot from that period on.

So as I go through this uh in reviewing some of the the points from the executive summary, just keep in mind that this really was a snapshot a year and a half ago, and a lot's changed.

And so that does make it a little bit challenging when it comes to master planning, of course.

Uh, but it was a snapshot at that time.

So with that, uh really the the whole point of this is is the growth of the airport, right?

So we currently have flights to Chicago, Dallas, Denver.

Uh we've got Charlotte starting uh the night of May 21st, first flight out May 22nd.

And then we have the Orlando flight starting on June 3rd, and we have Destin starting on June 5th.

So several uh several new flights, and ultimately this master plan was guided by the FAA.

Uh they walk alongside us with our consultant to really determine what things have we accomplished over the last 10, 15, 20 years, and really what's that snapshot look like in the future for projects that we need to ensure that our airport is ready and safe for growth.

Some of the projects that came out of the master plan, and I'll talk a lot more about projects that we've completed.

Uh, of course, we're recently uh in front of you.

We had the glycol recovery program uh and storage facility.

Uh we had the pasture boarding bridge, the aircraft rescue firefighting is uh is a fire station that'll be built at the airport in future years.

And then, of course, we had the what we call as the SRE building, uh snow removal equipment building that I'll talk about a little bit later.

Uh that really is gonna be the kickstart for development on the south end of the airfield as well.

And of course, uh that's grabbed a lot of attention is airport parking.

So, not necessarily is every project in the master plan going to be federally uh funded.

It really is again, it's what projects need to occur at the airport as we get certain thresholds and growth of the airport.

So I I mentioned this snapshot a year and a half ago when we started the master plan, and I think this is uh this is something that I brought up uh about the passenger numbers at the airport.

The FAA looking forward to 2044, uh projected us and approved a forecast of about 176,000 employments.

176,000 employments and people being flying out of the airport.

Uh currently we have an estimated, of course, flights are changing all the time, but we have an estimated of about 280,000 seats leaving the airport in 2026.

So uh with a 73 to 75% load factor, we're exceeding this by about 25,000 uh this year.

So we're uh we're definitely well ahead of the FAA forecast.

And uh of course, we can't you know, keep in mind we can't back up the master plan and say, okay, we're gonna start over because we got these new flights.

It really is.

We got to keep things moving uh based on the growth.

But super exciting to say that uh 176,000 was forecasted in 2043, and again, we'll probably have that around October uh of this this calendar year.

So the hold on, we use that microphone.

Okay.