Last Little Airport Gets Ready to Grow Up

Once a sewage dumping ground, the flat stretch of land in southeast Fullerton was suitable only for a pig farm nearly a century ago. Then airplanes came along.

The hogs’ haven became a perfect airstrip just before World War I, one of nearly a dozen that sprang up in Orange County as planes began filling the sky in the decades that followed. Fullerton Municipal Airport, almost 90 years old, remains “the last little airport around,” said manager Rod Propst.

Now the 86-acre general aviation facility is getting a face lift and a new master plan that could mean even further upgrades. Because the airport is landlocked by development, it can’t expand, but officials hope it can become more modern.

The changes come at a time when the city-owned airport has suffered a rash of airplane mishaps, incidents that have marred the facility’s usually excellent safety record.

On July 18, a door flew off a plane taking off from the airport, landing in a nearby transmission shop’s parking lot. The pilot had to make an emergency landing.

On Aug. 8, a small plane headed for the airport was forced to make an emergency landing on a street in Buena Park.

On Aug. 26, four people escaped injury when their plane lost power on a takeoff from the airport and ran off the runway into the grass, then crashed into a fence. The blue and white plane is still lying on its belly along the west wall.

“We get maybe three incidents a year where something goes wrong,” Propst said. “We just happened to get a year’s worth all in about a month.”

Keep in mind, he said, that the airport has nearly 100,000 takeoffs and landings a year. None of those incidents was related to inadequate conditions at the airport.

Even though the Buena Park landing was of concern to neighbors, the airport has not been a major target of safety worries in recent years. With more than 1 million takeoffs and landings in the last 15 years, there have been 35 accidents, aborted flights or near-collisions either at the airport or by planes using it.

“That airport was here before we were born,” said Emily Levine of Buena Park, whose home is in a flight pattern. “We all moved here knowing it was there.”

Levine for many years was part of the airport’s noise and safety committee, which includes residents of Fullerton and Buena Park. Its public meetings rarely drew any complaints, she said. The last big controversy came in the late 1980s, when some airport officials wanted to expand the runway so jets could land.

That idea was quickly shot down after an outpouring of opposition from neighbors.

But even a safe airport can become run-down without new money.

The airport will spend $2.5 million to rebuild the asphalt on the taxi ramp south of its 3,100-foot runway, and add wider, safer lanes for planes entering the runway.

The consultant drafting the modernization plan will explore other possible updates, such as changes to helicopter flight paths to curtail noise, increased airport fees and even whether remodeling of the terminal and air traffic tower is needed.

“With the master plan, we might not have a better airport, but it will certainly be more efficient,” Propst said.

The plan is required by the Federal Aviation Administration to make sure the airport has a solid future 20 years from now, Propst said.

The city is negotiating with a consultant who will make recommendations for the master plan proposal, a process that will include public hearings. Areas that might be considered:

* Changes to the terminal or the adjoining air traffic control tower, both built in the 1950s.The tower is accessible by four narrow flights of steps; there is no elevator.

* Altering helicopter flight patterns.

* Adding hangars. The airport has no room for expansion but does have space for three new hangars, Propst said.

And some hangars showing signs of age may have to come down.

But those hangars are actually the most popular, Propst said, because they’re the cheapest.

* Increasing service fees. The airport hasn’t increased its fees to users for more than 10 years, Propst said. A master plan may change that.