The airport in Panama City, Florida, is so quiet the control tower shuts down at 10 p.m. It offers a dozen daily commercial flights, half the number it had five years ago.
But that’s all about to change.
The federal agency in charge of protecting the US’s wetlands announced it has approved wiping out 2,000 acres of Florida “Panhandle” swamps for a new $330 million airport, which will be the first in the US to be built since 9-11.
The St. Joe Co., the Panhandle’s biggest developer, is donating the site 20 miles northwest of Panama City in a location so remote that its nearest neighbor is the 6,900-acre Pine Log State Forest.
At 4,000 acres, the completed airport will be larger than Tampa International Airport.
The project has slowly crept forward in recent years despite a 2004 nonbinding referendum vote, in which local residents voted 54% to 46% to oppose moving the airport – even though the ballot language said the move would not cost local taxpayers any money.
Report by David Wilkening
