Grant will Help Keene Airport Improve Taxiway

NORTH SWANZEY — Keene is working toward its goal of repairing and reconstructing a major taxiway at the city’s Dillant-Hopkins Airport in North Swanzey.

A recent $358,378 grant from the Bureau of Aeronautics will fund the design and permitting for an extension to taxiway A, which serves the airport’s primary runway. Built in 1989, the taxiway has deteriorated over the years, according to the city’s latest capital improvement program.

The project spans several years and includes replacing the taxiway as well as making it longer. The extension will add about 1,390 feet to the taxiway, making it approximately 3,500 feet long and 60 feet wide once completed. It will also provide a path to the end of runway 2, eliminating what city documents call the dangerous practice of planes backing up, or back-taxiing, to take off.

Completion, however, depends on whether the city receives the expected grants from the Federal Aviation Administration and the N.H. Department of Transportation, according to the capital improvement program. Federal grants are slated to cover 90 percent of the project costs, while the state would put up another 5 percent, leaving the city responsible for the remaining 5 percent.

Mark Goodrich, the airport manager contracted through the Vermont-based DuBois & King, said in November that the goal is to secure the grant money next fall for the construction of the taxiway extension. The reconstruction portion of the project isn’t expected to receive funding until mid-2022, with the work likely beginning in spring 2023.

Sierra Hubbard can be reached at 355-8546 or at [email protected]. Follow her on Twitter at @SierraHubbardKS.

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