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Colville Lake's $12 million airport a community effort
Aurora College taking advantage of construction training opportunitiesCarla Howell Northern News Services Published Friday, Oct. 28, 2011
“It’s something that came from the whole community,” said Joseph Kochon, president of Behdzi Ahda First Nation Economic Development Trust. “For a small community we have a lot of traffic.” Aside from passenger and cargo service to the community of 126, aviation traffic in the area is largely due to oil and gas exploration in the area. As an added bonus, the Department of Transportation is working with students from Aurora College to build the airport, giving them a chance to train on multiple machines as well as gain valuable experience for two weeks. Colville Lake's Tracy Eddibar has been working on the new airport for two years as part of the Aurora College program. “They had good instructors that explained things really well,” said Eddibar, “I caught on real fast. It was awesome because I love this job; it’s what I want to do.” Thirty-four people have been hired from the Colville Lake community to complete the airport. Work is divided into two shifts of 10 hours each from June until September and progress is overseen by the community. Superintendent of the operation, Jules Frechette, is the only person not from the community. “We hope the new airport will serve the community better and provide a safer means of transportation,” said Bill Chapple, the project manager for the development of the airport. “We hope that larger freight planes bringing in supplies will reduce the cost of living here.” Colville Lake currently has a cost of living three times higher than that of Yellowknife. “Our main concern is getting larger planes to land” said Chapple. “We don’t really have much tourism in the area.” The old airport’s runway prevented larger planes, such as the Dash-8 which can carry up to 30 passengers, from landing as the runway was too short. Expanding the old airport wasn't an option because it was next to Colville Lake and a cliff face. A relocation of the airport was required and construction began in 2009. With funding from the federal infrastructure stimulus fund, consultations and surveys were conducted by the Denendeh Development Corporation (DDC) in 2007 to gauge the need to expand airports in the Northwest Territories Area. Most communities were satisfied with their current airports except Colville Lake and Gaméti/Rae Lakes which had safety concerns about their airports. Surveys conducted by the DDC found the length of runways did not increase the risk of accidents in the area. They also concluded that the increase in traffic to Colville Lake is not great enough to warrant an extension to the Colville airport, though they also cited that an increase in living costs could arise because the current airport could not support all plane types. Transport Canada regulations specify that 914.4 metre runways are not adequate for planes that could service the community most effectively. The common length of runways, according to Transport Canada, is 1,524 metres and Colville Lake’s Airport runway is only 836 metres. “It’s nice to work as a team with people in your community,” said Eddibar. “It felt good to build roads and the airport in my own hometown.” Though the runway has been cleared of bush and gravelled, the terminal building, electrical work and lighting still need to be completed before it can open. Work will halt this winter while supplies are brought in over the ice road and it will resume again in the spring. Materials for the terminal will be shipped on this season's winter road, said Kochon. The terminal will be a small building with a waiting room and washroom facilities. “Hopefully next summer we’ll have a brand new airport to land on,” said Kochon.
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