It's always fun to cover visits to Lansing by federal officials.  One of my fondest memories is sitting in the back of a pickup truck with Congressman Arcuri while he toured Turek Farm and leaned, among other things, about the importance of migrant workers in local farming.  But while it was fun to cover Congressman Tom Reed's tour of the Ithaca-Tompkins Regional Airport Terminal Expansion and Rehabilitation project Wednesday, his visit was almost overshadowed by the efficiency and speed of getting this project done.

It would be fun to say that since the Governor announced the $24.7 million project a year ago last May it was simply born, fully grown, from the forehead of Zeus (boy, did Zeus ever have a headache after Athena was born!), a lot of work spearheaded by Airport Manager Mike Hall and other county officials led up to the project being realized.  The miracle here is somewhat on the scale of Greek Mythology, though, when you consider that an expansion of this scope is on schedule to be completed by the Governor's deadline, which is the end of this year.  This is government work.  Nothing happens fast in government.  But this is happening.

I dropped off a friend a few weeks ago, and as I drove up to the entrance I thought, 'Wait a minute... the entrance is gone!'  I had to leave her to go in through the baggage claim exit.  The old entrance is all torn up on the inside, and a sizable addition has been built on one side of it.  The inside is teaming with workers installing things in the ceiling, the new check-in counters, and so on.  The old floor is still there, while the new section has a plywood floor.

Hall said Wednesday that the expanded entrance where travelers will check in will be open and operational the week after Labor Day, which is only three and a half weeks away.   The arrivals/departure concourse, which is entirely new and doesn't even have outside walls yet will be fully operational November 29th.


It was certainly fun to see the back offices, and the new, more efficient baggage handling areas.  But the entryway and the concourse are massive projects, or they certainly felt massive as we toured them.  The entryway is a more finished (using the term loosely) than the concourse.  But anyone who has worked with a contractor knows that staying on schedule is more a concept than a reality for most projects, and this is government work... yet this impressive project is on schedule.

This is not only government work, but there are several governments involved including federal, state and local governments.  Yet this project is happening on time.  That the project could get all the permits in that time is remarkable in itself, let alone actually finishing the whole project in just over a year.

This is bad news for governments.  True to the stereotype, government projects typically take way too much time and spend more money than anyone else doing an equivalent project would spend.  Back when I was growing up in Massachusetts there were a lot of jokes about how somebody in the construction trade must have had a relative in the State House, the only logical explanation for the never-ending road construction on the Massachusetts Turnpike.  Our local Airport is a unique example of getting a well defined project done quickly and efficiently.  Now we have to ask governments who don't complete budgets on time and at budget, why didn't you do that?

You don't have to tour the airport to understand that makes this project remarkable.  Maybe Zeus is involved after all.

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I hope I didn't just jinx it - after all there are five more months before the deadline.  So far, so good.

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