Forklifts are moving and drills are whirring – signs that construction workers building a new two-story wing of the Sitka airport terminal are hard at work when I visit the site on August 12. They just finished pouring concrete slabs over the weekend, but each one is a little smoother than the last – evidence of a classic southeast Alaska construction challenge.
“The rain caused a kind of blistering and a little slime layer to form on top. If you scrape that off, you can almost tell the difference between the two pours,” says Joseph Bea, Sitka Airport’s terminal manager, pointing to one of the panels. “This one was done on Saturday in much better weather than this one.”
Bea says they’ve had a lot of nice weather recently and that this has helped the construction team make quick progress.
“Our roof is fully installed, the entire roof cover against snow and ice is ready, everything is mounted on the roof so that our escalator stays nice and dry and protected while we build everything around it,” he says.
That’s great news because the escalator arrived earlier than expected and she can’t wait to install it. The nearly half-million-dollar marvel arrived on the ship in a single shipping container.
“It was so packed in the cargo container that they had to pull the escalator out of the cargo container with a forklift, then bring in the crane, catch it in the middle and then, very carefully, pull it out,” says Bea.
Now it’s waiting in a corner of the site, wrapped tightly in opaque plastic. No one has seen it yet. That will soon change. Today it’s being installed. But it’s a tricky business maneuvering around the construction site.
“We’ll take the crane and drop it through our skylight up here. Then we’ll bring it down and attach it to our escalator, which has been over there for a few weeks,” says Bea. “We’ll attach it to that and then pull it through sideways with a forklift.”
Sitka’s first escalator is part of a major terminal expansion project costing about $45 million, the majority of which is federal funding from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Act. Sitka is one of many airports across the country using the Airport Improvement and Airport Terminal Financing programs to make needed upgrades.
Over the next nine months, Sitka will complete the two-story addition that will include a new jetway to the jet bridge, passenger screening, restrooms, and a new food court. Right now, we are standing on the first floor of the new gate lounge area.
“This will be the sterile waiting room for the passengers,” says Bea. “They will go through TSA in this section here and then come out into this area, and that’s all behind the security checkpoint.”
Perhaps even more exciting than the escalator is the increase in space and seating. The gate lounges will be five times larger. Bea says the ground floor lounge will have about 140 seats, and the upstairs lounge will have a similar capacity. Bea estimates there are 40-50 seats in the waiting area at the moment.
“This will be a significant improvement,” says Bea. “The FAA has identified this as a critical deficiency, and that is exactly what we are trying to fix with this project.”
The new section of Sitka Airport Terminal is scheduled to open in May 2025. Bea is optimistic that the construction team will meet the deadline.
“The challenges are real, but I have to give the team a lot of credit. Nate, the buyer, did a great job. It’s like I always turn around and get exactly what I need, exactly what I need, and on time. It was almost magical,” says Bea. “The team tried really hard to stay ahead of schedule and get things done on time. That’s a big reason why we are where we are: because these guys work really hard.”
Once the new departure area is completed, workers will turn to remodeling the existing airport building, with the second phase scheduled to be completed by summer 2026.
