Closing Hartford-Brainard Airport for either industrial or mixed-use redevelopment is possible, but it could cost tens of millions of dollars to rid the 200-acre airfield of contamination and it could take years to fully reap property tax and economic development potential, a new study concludes. Instead, as expected, the Brainard Airport Property Study recommends keeping the airport open and extending one of its runways. But this alternative — one of four outlined in a final report — calls for the closing of a lesser-used runway and redeveloping the area primarily for warehouse and industrial uses. The report — the culmination of a $1.5 million, state-funded study by BFJ Planning of New York over eight months — was a bit anti-climactic because its conclusion was contained in a draft report whose recommendation surfaced earlier in October. According to BFJ, Total development costs range from $46 million for the recommended option to $1.4 billion for the mixed-use alternative. These numbers do not include the use of public subsidies in the calculations.
There’s a recommended redevelopment plan for a CT airport. See how it stacks up with alternatives.