b'RUNWAYS AVL31before the permanent runway even opened. Halfway throughseveral years, and no contractor has denied work and no surety 2022, traffic is on a trajectory to exceed that record. has rejected putting that language into the bond, Bleiweis reports. Moose attributes much of the projects ultimate success to theSpeaking from the engineering firms point of view, Moose core teams collaboration. We had to work very closely togetherlearned some lessons hell carry forward to future projects, too. so that everyone understood what actually had to be constructedThis project really forced the whole team to come together and for each phase and how much money we had, he remarks. Itwork through a lot of the problems that this type of phased design was really a collaborative effort to keep the construction movingcreates, he reflects. I think it gave us all a different perspective, but keep the airfield open. and really a better understanding of how these projects can Bleiweis also credits Reisman, who oversaw the project fordevelop in the future.AVL. Hes the one who lived it day-to-day for the whole seven years, especially the last three years when we were all dealingAdditional Improvement Aheadwith a project that kind of went sideways for a period of time. There are a few more important numbers in this story. The new taxiway provides easy access to 40 acres of land suitable for Lessons Learned aeronautical development on the west side of the airport. Before Moving forward, the airport has changed one important practicethe taxiway was installed, there was no way to get aircraft to and Bleiweis suspects other airports might want to adopt. One of thefrom that valuable area. The control tower will be moved out of the things we learned is that there was no language in the bond thatexisting terminal building and relocated there this year.prevented the surety company from rehiring a contractor that wasIn addition, AVLone of the nations fastest-growing airportsunderperforming, he explains, noting thats exactly what happenedhas announced plans for a $230 million project to more than in Phase 4. Now when drafting bid documents, AVL makes sure itsdouble the size of its existing terminal from 113,000 to 275,000 bond language explicitly says the surety company cant rehire ansquare feet. underperforming contractor. Weve been doing it this way now for #1water blasting choice for airportsrubber removal, paint removal, paint rejuventation, terminal cleaningw w w . T h e H o g . c o mAirportImprovement.comJuly | August 2022'