Airport Business - 25

COVER STORY
landscape and attracting new tenants,
to community-focused events. In the
immediate, those community-inspired
events are the airport's most tangible and
proving to be most crucial in reshaping
KCKV's image.
"We're hosting our third annual Wags
and Wings Family Fun and Oktoberfest
in September. It's shaping up to be the
biggest one so far, if this year's show is
as successful as we hope it will be next
year we're going to bring in a company
to basically give us a turnkey air show,"
Vaughn said. "We've got a ton of positive
feedback of all the activity that we've
been generating here because for a
long time this airfield was sort of going
downhill. About 10 years ago is when
it kind of made that turnaround. Our
airport manager, John Patterson, does
an exceptional job. He's a great airport
manager and really breathed new life into
Outlaw Field. We have people stop in all
the time and they're like, 'I can't believe
the turnaround at this place. I was here
10 years ago and there was one dusty old
Cessna parked out on the tarmac and that
was it.' Now it's not uncommon to have
six jets parked out front."
Vaughn has also initiated Chamber
afterhours meetings, Clarksville Young
Professionals mingles, Clarksville Local
small business meetings, Leadership

Clarksville Tours and a concert right in
the terminal by the Gateway Chamber
Orchestra.
These community focused events
are, as Fuehne said, a crucial first step to
getting an airport where they ultimately
want to be.
"Really make sure that you're
influencing what the community knows
about you. I can't tell you how many
times our clients say they were out in
the community and someone said 'We
have an airport?'. And, it's like, well, how
do you overcome that? What do you have
to do to overcome that? It's not really a
stigma but just a lack of knowledge of
what the airport should provide," said
Fuehne.
And ultimately, KCKV's goals are
to utilize their land - both 55 acres at
the south end of KCKV that has taxiway
access and is "prime for development,"
Vaughn said - and a large piece of land
with a significant hill that, Vaughn said,
would cost too much to level off, so the
airports sees its future as either farm land
or a solar farm.
However, Vaughn's dream for the
airport is bigger.
"My goal is to land a large
transportation, logistics and cargo
company. At the moment we can't
support any large passenger airplanes.

Clarksville Regional Airport, also known as
Outlaw Field, has been reshaping the airport
image and gaining more traffic since coming
out of a downturn ten years ago.
JOSH VAUGHN PHOTOGRAPHY

We just don't have the space to extend
our runway so we're kind of limited in
what we can support here. I think what
would be ideal is smaller cargo caravan
style airplanes. I'd love to see cargo flights
coming and going every day. There's
certainly a huge earning potential here
for any transportations company looking
to ship goods in and around middle
Tennessee. I think that's what makes the
most sense for where we are right now,"
described Vaughn.
Currently for their efforts, KCKV has
secured business from Austin Peay State
University, who is starting a rotary wings
flight program, and have leased out half
of KCKV's largest hangar for teaching
students to work on the helicopters and
are expecting to house more helicopters
at KCKV within the coming year. And
a new hangar that KCKV is currently
constructing is attracting attention,
Vaughn said, from Nashville based charter
company JetRight - who Vaughn said is
considering basing some of their aircraft
at KCKV.
And to help find a developer for
their land, KCKV has teamed up with
the Tennessee Economic Development
Council to produce a drone-shot video
of the land to use in presentations to
prospective clients. Steps that Fuehne said
are critical to an airport's success.
"Plan as much as you can reasonably
plan to go forward. Make sure that you
are partners with your community,
with the FAA, with your economic
development groups in town. Understand
what they see coming on the horizon,
and what those things are. So that, as an
airport, the FBO, you can kind of react
and help them plan going forward. You
want the airport to be an economic driver
for your region, for your city, for your
community. I think it's just the constant
planning to move forward from that route.
Not everything works out the way you
plan. Sometimes you'll see your plan 10
years ago and be like, 'Ah. Not sure what
we were thinking.' But, at the same time,
you made the effort and you geared your
resources toward that. But at the end of
the day, it's better to have something
rather than nothing. If you have nothing,
you don't have the opportunity to bring
in the Amazons, the DHL, the FedEx's.
You're not going to have that opportunity,
so you have to plan," said Fuehne. 

OCTOBER 2019 \ AVIATIONPROS.COM / 25
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Airport Business

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