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Just north of the Indiana Toll Road, off Cline Avenue, sits the Gary/Chicago International Airport.
Its name sounds substantial. Its annual budget is in the millions of dollars. And Chicagoans -- along with citizens of Gary -- spend millions in tax dollars every year to help keep it in business.
But in spite of an annual operating budget of more than $3 million -- plus tens of millions more being spent on a runway expansion and other capital projects -- the GCIA terminal sits mostly empty. The front entrance is usually locked; the parking lot is nearly vacant, and the skies are -- for the most part -- empty.
That’s because GCIA has only one passenger flight -- Allegiant Airlines Flight 650. It flies nonstop from Sanford, Fla., to Gary, where passengers unload and new passengers board. Allegiant changes the flight number to 651, and the plane takes off and heads back to Sanford.
It’s time on the ground in Gary: Usually less than one hour.
Once the flight is gone, the terminal is shut down and locked up for several days. The Allegiant flight only comes to Gary twice a week, on Thursdays and Sundays. That’s it.
It’s one of the many curiosities of The Little Airport that Could.
While the airport gets substantial funding from the City of Gary, the State of Indiana and the federal government, it gets additional millions of dollars every year from the City of Chicago -- more than $3.6 million dollars since the beginning of 2011 alone, financial documents reveal. Since 1995, Chicago has sent a total of more than $26 million to help operate the Gary airport.
It all comes from an agreement signed by the cities of Chicago and Gary in 1995, which proposed "the development, enhancement, and operation of existing airports and development of any new Regional Airport serving the Bi-State Region."
The agreement is commonly referred to as "The Compact," and the two mayors who signed it -- Richard M. Daley of Chicago and Thomas Barnes of Gary -- originally saw it as a fairly straightforward three-year deal. But it continued, and throughout the years it has often been used as a pawn in the political fights for a third airport in Chicago to counter the proposals to build such an airport in Chicago’s 10th Ward, or -- more recently -- in far-south-suburban Peotone.
"The Compact" was also floated as a possible solution to the closing of Meigs, even before Daley ordered his bulldozers out to dig up Meigs’ runways in the middle of the night in March of 2003.
Now -- 17 years later -- "The Compact" still exists, and the money still flows in from Chicago.
More investigative reporting from NBCChicago
Part of "The Compact" requires Chicago to send monthly checks to the Gary Airport from ticket fees paid by passengers arriving and departing at O’Hare and Midway Airports. Those fees alone amounted to $2.4 million paid to Gary in the past year and a half. This "Passenger Facility Charge" -- or PFC money -- is earmarked for capital projects like Gary’s 1900-foot runway extension, currently under construction, and the relocation of railroad tracks, which must be moved to provide sufficient clearance for larger planes to land on the newly-extended runway.
But on top of the passenger fees, Chicago taxpayers also send money to GCIA, every year, to help with the daily operation of the airport. In the past year and a half, that’s amounted to more than $1.1 million from Chicago taxpayers, over and above the $2.4 million from the ticket fees.
And Gary taxpayers pay millions more, each year, as well.
To date, there hasn’t been much to show for all that money. GCIA has seen commercial service come and go in past years -- notably PanAm, Southeast, and Hooters Air. There have been long periods where no passenger planes landed there. Even Allegiant, with its one flight twice a week, is technically not a commercial flight, but a travel service which operates charter flights to smaller-traffic airports. It just started flying in to Gary last February.
The flight itself appears to be a success, with low-cost tickets and easy online booking that regularly attracts a full load of passengers. But the question remains: Is all this tax money worth it, for just two passenger flights a week?
Karen Freeman-Wilson is Gary’s newly-elected, Harvard-educated mayor, and she has often cited GCIA as one of her top priorities for Gary’s struggling future. She is happy to see the nearly-full passenger loads on the Allegiant flight.
"I think it’s indicative of the demand that is pent up for the Gary airport," she said.
But she acknowledges that -- to date at least -- far less business has been generated than the money that is pumped in.
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"I think a lot has to do with the marketing effort," she said. "I think it’s important to be able to market Gary as a destination -- to market its proximity not just to Chicago but to downtown Chicago."
And once the runway expansion is complete, Freeman-Wilson sees things taking off.
"Ultimately I think there’s an opportunity for commercial and cargo service here," she said.
But the runway expansion has been a difficult and expensive process, primarily because of unforeseen difficulties in moving the railroad tracks, as well as dealing with construction waste and even oil dumped in the runway’s path.
In an effort to see what happens during a typical day at the terminal, NBC Chicago went to the Gary/Chicago International Airport on a Wednesday. There was not an Allegiant flight scheduled for that day, but the thought was that maybe the terminal would be open for other operations.
That was not the case. The front doors were locked and the place was deserted.
So NBC Chicago returned, unannounced, at noon on a Thursday, when Allegiant does fly in. This time the front door was unlocked, but inside the airport was still virtually empty, with the lights turned off, the ticket counter dark and the baggage carousel silent and still.
A plaque on the wall noted that the terminal was renovated a decade ago. It still looks good as new.
The only people there were a security guard and approximately 15 TSA agents. Their supervisor said they are routinely borrowed from other airports -- South Bend and Chicago -- to come to GCIA twice a week to handle the Allegiant flight.
Finally, about an hour and a half before Allegiant’s scheduled arrival, the airport suddenly sprung to life. Crowds of couples and families snaked along the previously-deserted rope lines in front of the ticket counter. Others removed their shoes and loaded up grey plastic bins to go through security. And when the Allegiant flight arrived at about 2:50 p.m., more passengers streamed out into the terminal and outside to waiting cars. The terminal was truly bustling.
But after another hour, the approximately 140 passengers booked for Sanford were boarded, and the plane took off, not to return for three days.
Then the TSA agents packed up. The ticket counter closed down. And it was lights out until Sunday.
Statement from Chicago's Department of Aviation:
The City of Chicago continues to support the Compact as Gary Airport serves as a reliever airport in the regional Chicago airport system. The City recognizes that these are times of tight budgets and has reduced the annual contribution to the Chicago Gary Regional Airport Authority.
Takeoffs/Landings for area airports from Jan. 1 - Aug. 1, 2012:
Unit 5 looked at the daily air traffic -- including every takeoff and landing of passenger, private, and corporate aircraft -- at Gary/Chicago International Airport, and compared its traffic to that at other comparable airports in the Chicago/Northwest Indiana area. In our survey of various time periods covering 2012, we found that Gary (GYY) had less daily traffic than Waukegan Regional Airport (UGN), Dupage Airport in West Chicago (DPA), Chicago Executive Airport in Wheeling (PWK), and Chicago Rockford Airport in Rockford (RFD).
In this chart, every takeoff or landing is counted separately. For example, if a plane lands at an airport, and then takes off two hours later, it would count twice on this chart.
One significant exception was August 2012, when GCIA served as the staging area for aircraft used in the Chicago Air and Water Show.
View Operations at regional airports in Chicago in a larger map
Leave a Comment:
What is missing for Gary is the lack of a Port facility to support the airport. They need plans drawn up so they can berth the Edmund Fitzgerald when it comes in. This is true forward thinking government at it's best.
Good point. But they shouldn't limit themselves solely to commercial shipping. A nice modern cruise terminal would attract top cruise liners such as the Andrea Doria and the Norway.
if the government would actually audit all this waste of money we could probably lower the deficit by half.
It's just common sense that is completely lacking in government from the city to the state to the federal.
The OTHER boondoggle AP is in Southern Illinois, near ST Louis, Illinois is the useless Airport state of the United States, more federal and State tax money goes to paying for mafia contractors and consultants than in any other State than maybe NJ! suckers!
Remind me which current President is from Chicago and who has a proven track record of spending money for no return?
cept for the fact the airport is in INDIANA!!!
You might wanna re-read the article.
I think you stopped at Chicago.
So Sheeple why is Chicago taxpayers sending money to GCIA, every year, to help with the daily operation of the airport. In the past year and a half, that’s amounted to more than $1.1 million from Chicago taxpayers,
Indiana, that is just a technicality! Gary is Illinois, bought and paid for by mafia dons for years! it is Obama country.
Anyone who has ever lived in the "Chicagoland" / Gary region of NW Indiana and Chicago would not be surprised one bit by this.
It is certainly one of the most corrupt areas in the country. If the name "Fast Eddie" Vrdolyak rings a bell, you are one of the people who knows I'm not exaggerating.
Between the racism (from BOTH sides), the corruption and the weather, I couldn't wait to get the hell out of there.
We never noticed you left.
I doubt you notice much of anything.
I got out of that racist corrupted hellhole as quickly as possible, and couldn't be paid enough to ever go back there.
Enjoy it all, schmuck - especially the rotten weather, the crime, the gangs and the openly corrupt politicians. Lucky you.
:D
15 TSA agents for one plane takeoff? Just more waste added on top of waste.
Robert from PA, when was the last time you flew? It takes 1 agent to act as guide, 1 to check boarding passes, 1 to load the gray boxes, 2 to watch the x-rays of bags, 1 to make sure you're totally metal free, 1 to moniter the body scanner, 1 to gude you through the scanner, 1 to check the unloading of the gray boxes and 1 to haul the empty gray boxes to the loader. That's a total of 10 for 1 line. If they are processing 140 passengers and their baggage in a resonable amount of time, twice that number would be needed. So the TSA is utilizing 15 agents to do the work actually 20 agents need to do. So, really we have a savings in our tax dollars here................. LOL................
BTW, if you watched the video, the TSA agents come from other airports. If there is 5 fewer TSA agents needed, that means less travel pay also. So 2 flights a day, 1 departure and 1 arrival 2x a week, the tax payers are saving a bundle.
Karen Freeman-Wilson, Gary’s newly-elected, Harvard-educated mayor is at least an idiot and very probably a crook to let something like this be perpetuated!
Bridge to Nowhere - Alaska
Wasted Multi- Million Dollar Airport - Indiana.
What do these both have in common?
Both Red States, with Red Voters, and Red Legislatures.
But yeah, blame it on the Democrats.
The Pubs stopped reading at Chicago, and haven't noticed the Airport is in the very red state of Indiana.
Sorry Pubby, the dems started this. Fact check your dates of the agreement.
So Sheeple it's OK for Chicago taxpayers to send money to GCIA, every year, to help with the daily operation of the airport. In the past year and a half, that’s amounted to more than $1.1 million from Chicago taxpayers
Gee I wonder where our current president was? Isn't he from chicago? Wasn't he in the governement there? Gee lets get more government to figure it out! Im sure he will hire some more of his cronnies so they have a job!
great post!
no read the article.
the airport is in GARY INDIANA!
p.s. Indiana is not the same state that Chicago is in. It has a different government, and it's republican led.
Another example of "pork barrel" politics, no doubt?
Pubby Sheeple, how does obama's azz taste?
I dunno what Obama has to do with an Airport in a state next door to his home state, build decades before Obama took office.
But apparently in a pubby brain, it's all a grand conspiracy to make you gay.
Sheeple miss the part about Chicago taxpayers sending money to GCIA, every year, to help with the daily operation of the airport. In the past year and a half, that’s amounted to more than $1.1 million from Chicago taxpayers,
Yeah? Sounds to me like yet ANOTHER RED STATE sucking tax dollars out of Blue States, while complaining about how much they pay!
More Entitlement Red States.
Bill,
You are exactly right. Not many commerical flights (listed as 360 annually) , but between military, air taxi, general aviation local and iternant, the total is 30,000 operations a year. 89 based aircraft. Thats 82 operations aday. I don't think anyone would want to add that to Midway or O'Hare..
Imagine a 747 wanting to take off, waiting for a Cessna 150 to land...
It may not seem like it, but, it is smart money spent.
More proof that wasteful government projects, once started, are harder to kill than a New York cockroach. There is no economic case that could possibly justify this airport. The cities of Gary and Chicago could provide free limousine service to people going to other airports and they would still come out ahead.
Take a deeper look and you'll probably find some of that money going into the private pockets of government officials.
Another Harvard educated person who thinks they know about business - why does it not suprise me that Chicago is involved - politcal coruptness at it's finest - wonder how many pockets were greased to get those contracts - a total waste of money - I can't believe that the citizens of Chicago put up with their money being wasted on something this absurd
Too bad the article wasn't about another money sucking government supported airport like the DuPage Airport. Another waste of Taxpayer Dollars. And our elected officials down state can't figure out how to balance a budget, you think it might be because they don't know how to say NO. Time to get Quinn out and bring in a Scott Walker type. But then this is the Land of the Liberals and nothing will change in Illinois until everyone is broke and living on Government Welfare.
Help me to understand why airports should be subsidized at all. I know why they are subsidized. Because those that can corrupt the politicians and use lobbyists to their advantage make out like bandits. Others have to do the same thing because they have to compete with subsidized services. Free markets handle these kind of issues beautifully. If there is appropriate demand and someone thinks they can make a profit, then stuff gets built. If you are privately funding something, you are damn sure careful you are not going to build an airport that doesn't make sense. That does not stop politicians at all levels from building airports (and many other things) that don't make sense (as long as their buddies and themselves make out on the real estate by insider buying).
This BS about needing to build subsidize regional airports for all the local mixed use, etc, is ridiculous as well. Private plane users should pay for what the usage actually costs. Why are people who like to garden versus flying a private plane subsidizing these people? Why do so many people fail to understand why markets are so effective. They force realistic tradeoffs based on ACTUAL costs. When you start subsidizing everything, you distort markets and continuously get ridiculous results with tremendous waste (and of course a few corrupt winners).
As an addenda, all these subsidies also come with a tremendous bureaucratic overhead. You've got several government entities (Federal, multiple state and local entities all shuffling paperwork among each other). The cost of this overhead is unbelievable and provides no benefit in productivity.
I think those Subsidies are the Point!!
The article fails to mention the REAL reason the airport is open and why Chicago PROBABLY throws money that way. Boeing has their corporate fleet of jets there, 6 Challengers and 2 BBJ's. I would guess that when Chicago was courting Boeing from Seattle, they promised a convenient location for the corporate hangar along with all the tax incentives ect.....
Don't get me wrong I love planes which means I love Boeing and I'm glad they came here, just pointing out something that wasn't mentioned and probably should have been.
The corrupt Chicago political machine was concerned because there were plans to build a second full service airport in the Chicago area and they would be unable to control the lucrative contracts that would go into its construction. The Chicago solution was the "compact" and an expantion of already too big O'Hare airport. That way Chicago could continue to hand out contracts to its freinds for O'Hare and Midway (an airport limited to the smaller passenger jets). This is the corrupt way of running government that we have in Chicago abd unfortunately it has now been expanded to the federal government.
Wow, this is on par with the airport in Alaska that they're building on a island for a town that has the population of a few dozen people. Sickening.
Don't ya just luv govm'nt waste? As for the posted comment about collateral business - this airport is open 2 days a week, for less than an hour - the artilce pointed out parking lot was empty (so no parking lot business) TSA agents were borrowed from other airports (why do they need 15 of them?) the article didn't mention anything about kiosks for coffee, donuts, cookies, sandwiches, etc so I assume that there were none because the place isn't open long enough and there's only (1) flight in/out - so no justification for such a thing - this airport is a boondoggle - and it was open and "operating" before our current pres took office - I quite often shake my head in disbelief at the commentary blaming the current president for everything, including the cost of gasoline (such nonsense) - It has to be because of the color of his skin - but if I may be so bold here, he was duly elected by the people, by a landslide - the people spoke - get a clue - we as a nation have moved into the 21st century leaving the old, outdated prejudices behind - we as a nation move towards that goal where "...the content of a [man's] character..." will be the determining factor. Hallelujah!
Ah...the race card. A true sign of desperation. As as Obama, fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me. This country won't survive 4 more years of this...
Kate- the airport is not "open 2 days a week", it's open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week for aircraft to use. The terminal, for commercial passenger use, is not. Big difference.
As others have pointed out, some 30,000 aircraft operations occur there on a yearly basis. The airport is not a boondoggle.
I suggest you learn more about general aviation. Whether you realize it or not, you benefit from it.
http://www.aopa.org/info/what_ga.pdf
Just think some contributor or friend of someone in government got rich over this pork project I mean stimulus project.
These are positive assets. Let's use them wisely. They could be used for cargo planes, private jets, and flight schools and etc. If we demolish them now, we may never have another chance in the future. By then, all we can do is to complaint delayed/cancelled/missing flights of flights.
I saw the article's title and read on with great anxiety. Whew. That was a close one. I am glad that Youngstown International Airport was not mentioned. Some people don't realize that Youngstown needs that airport to fly in repair teams just in case those dirty huns and/or japs bomb the steel mills.