{"id":33473,"date":"2025-11-24T22:43:03","date_gmt":"2025-11-24T22:43:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/?p=33473"},"modified":"2025-11-24T22:43:05","modified_gmt":"2025-11-24T22:43:05","slug":"ohio-businesses-pilots-and-schools-unite-to-oppose-request-to-close-burke-lakefront-airport","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/news\/airports\/ohio-businesses-pilots-and-schools-unite-to-oppose-request-to-close-burke-lakefront-airport\/%20","title":{"rendered":"Ohio Businesses, Pilots, and Schools Unite to Oppose Request to Close Burke Lakefront Airport\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association (AOPA) has joined the Lakefront Airport Preservation Partnership (LAPP), a coalition made up of local businesses, aviation organizations, and schools\u2014to oppose Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb\u2019s misguided effort to permanently close Burke Lakefront Airport<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last month, Mayor Bibb asked the federal government to relieve the city of Cleveland of its obligation to keep the airport open. In a letter<\/a> sent today to Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy, Senators Bernie Moreno and Jon Husted, and Representative Shontel Brown, the LAPP highlighted that the FAA and state of Ohio have awarded nearly $20 million in grants to improve the airport\u2014funding that requires Burke Lakefront to remain open until the late 2030s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBy accepting these grants, the city has agreed to operate and maintain the airport,\u201d the letter states. \u201cTemporary politicians should not be able to ignore or undo commitments made by their predecessors, which will have negative long-term impacts. Simply casting the airport to the wayside and placating to Mayor Bibb\u2019s wishes is not in the best interest of the public, the aviation system, or the City of Cleveland.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBurke Lakefront Airport isn\u2019t just used by general aviation pilots\u2014it\u2019s a vital asset to northeast Ohio and the country,\u201d said AOPA Great Lakes Regional Manager Kyle Lewis. \u201cPlanes take off and land there more than 50,000 times each year, and the airport serves as an important link for public safety, medevac operations, Coast Guard missions and training, flight training, educational opportunities, and more. For example, just one medevac operator based at Burke Lakefront operates more than 500 medical and organ transplant flights there every year.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn cases like this, if a public airport is going to close, the entity running that airport\u2014in this case, the city of Cleveland\u2014must prove to the FAA that the closure is in the public\u2019s best interest, and they must provide a plan for another local airport to absorb the traffic and infrastructure,\u201d added Lewis. \u201cMayor Bibb has done none of that. We\u2019ve checked with other airports in the area. Many of them operate at or near capacity, and none of them can handle the influx of traffic or the expansion of infrastructure needed to support these operations.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In its letter, the LAPP invited Mayor Bibb to meet with the group to discuss how the airport can continue to play an important role for the city of Cleveland.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association (AOPA) has joined the Lakefront Airport Preservation Partnership (LAPP), a coalition made up of local businesses, aviation organizations, and schools\u2014to oppose Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb\u2019s misguided effort to permanently close Burke Lakefront Airport. Last month, Mayor Bibb asked the federal government to relieve the city of Cleveland of its […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[33,55],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-33473","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-airports","category-ohio"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33473","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33473"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33473\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33474,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33473\/revisions\/33474"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33473"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33473"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33473"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}