The Granite Falls Municipal Airport is a city-owned, public-use airport located four miles south of Granite Falls in southwest Minnesota. It’s small—with 5,200 square feet of paved surface, eight hangars, and 25 planes in total—but because it brings both businesses and tourists to town, it has a significant impact on the local community.
The airport gives a variety of services to the local community. It houses two jets and two piston airplanes on behalf of Fagen Incorporated, a local construction company that uses the airport to transport personnel. The airport also has four private hangars where local small businesses and private owners can store their planes.
“Airports are always important to economic development because we live in a mobile society and the airport is another means to make us accessible to the bigger world,” says Keith Woods, manager of the airport. “It attracts business because people like to be able to come and go.”
The airport is also commonly used by the local hospital—Granite Falls Health—to airlift critical patients to more advanced facilities in the Twin Cities and Rochester.
“It’s challenging having a hospital without some sort of airlift possibility,” says Crystal Johnson, city manager of Granite Falls.
The biggest tourist draw of the airport is the Fagen Fighters World War II Museum. Located on the airport grounds, it was officially opened in 2012 and features a diverse collection of antique planes, vehicles, art exhibits, and media from WWII. Once every three years it hosts an aerial show during which the antique planes are brought out and flown. The 2018 show drew around 17,000 people and brought a spike in tourism business to the nearby town.
“When people come to the event, they’re visiting the local stores, they’re eating at local restaurants—which in turn helps the overall local economy,” Johnson says.
The Granite Falls airport was not always widely appreciated by the community. According to Woods, prior to its construction in 1996, locals were skeptical of the need for a new airport and were concerned about the cost and land acquisition involved.
“But perception has changed because people see that it attracts people, which is good for the whole local economy,” Woods says.
The airport has grown steadily over the years; around 2005, it had a 650-foot displaced threshold added to one of its runways. In 2017, the airport was resurfaced and added an 800-foot stopway to the north end. Plans to expand further are on the table; the airport is currently waiting to hear back from the state about an eight-unit T-hangar that Woods says they hope to build sometime in 2019 or 2020.
“I really want to extend kudos to MnDOT Aeronautics for working with us to make improvements,” Woods says. “Under the current leadership, it’s been a dramatically improved situation for the small, state-funded airports.”
— Sophia Koch
Editor’s note: Be sure to join Minnesota Viking Harrison Smith on a tour of the Fagen Fighters World War II Museum at this year’s Minnesota Airports Conference in April!
