Expanded Service Seen for Palmdale Airport

Mayor Richard Riordan and federal aviation officials announced Friday that the ongoing expansion of Los Angeles International and Ontario International airports will be extended to Palmdale Regional Airport, which will have its passenger service restored and cargo handling facilities increased within a decade.

Passenger service to Palmdale was halted more than a year ago. But a “cooperation agreement” between Los Angeles and Palmdale officials envisions new cargo and passenger facilities, as well as additional highway and rail access to the high desert airport.

Those improvements, among others, should allow the Los Angeles-owned airport to serve as many as 4 million passengers a year by 2010 and as many as 7 million by 2020, officials said. LAX now handles 60 million passengers a year.

“The demands of the next century are going to be tremendous,” Riordan said. “Air cargo is going to go up four to five times in the next 20 years. We need it to be competitive.”

Federal Aviation Administrator Jane Garvey, who joined Riordan at City Hall for the announcement, said the agreement will benefit other airports in the region, including LAX and Ontario, by easing demand on facilities whose proposed expansion has been politically controversial.

“We no longer can think about airports individually. We really have to think of them as a system,” Garvey said.

Palmdale Mayor James Ledford heralded the agreement’s potential economic impact on his city: “It’s going to change the perception of Palmdale and the Antelope Valley. We think the potential for development is fantastic,” he said.

City Councilwoman Ruth Galanter, who has pushed for regional alternatives to a massive LAX expansion, agrees but remains cautiously optimistic. Galanter said that though she was pleased to hear officials strongly supporting Palmdale’s expansion, she wants to see their financial commitment as well.

“Today’s announcement is a real breakthrough, but it is only the beginning,” Galanter said. “I challenge the mayor and LAWA [Los Angeles World Airports] to produce a serious investment plan for Palmdale, including service commitments from the airlines, within six months.”

Under the cooperation agreement, officials will convene a “Palmdale Working Group,” made up of various public and private agencies, to develop an action plan for Palmdale, including an investment strategy.

Although city officials say such unanswered questions as whether commercial airlines will want to offer cargo and passenger service at Palmdale airport still exist, they say they faced similar obstacles when they expanded Ontario as well. Last year, the airports department completed a $270-million expansion there. On Friday, officials said they plan to continue their efforts, expanding Ontario’s annual capacity to about 15 million to 20 million passengers in the future.

Opponents of LAX expansion have pushed for a bigger role for Palmdale airport.

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Times staff writer Nicholas Riccardi contributed to this story.