WHITE PLAINS, Dec. 26 — With the demand for private air travel increasing and space at most airports in urbanized areas at a premium, fixed-based operators — the companies that perform maintenance and other services for noncommercial aircraft — are under pressure to expand into whatever areas they can find, or to improve the facilities they have.
Take the case of Avitat Westchester, which has been storing and servicing private aircraft here since 1993. Using some of the last property available for new construction at Westchester County Airport, Avitat opened a high-security $9 million, 48,000-square-foot office and hangar complex this month. In addition to renting out space in its two hangars to corporations and businesses, Avitat also refuels private aircraft and provides other ground services for clients like J. P. Morgan Chase, American Express, Hillary and Bill Clinton, Paul Newman and Richard Gere, said Michael W. Dolphin, the company’s president and chief executive.
The company caters to its clientele from its gleaming new glass and steel building with a two-story lobby, five floor-to-ceiling fish tanks, a baby grand piano and a Starbucks.
Avitat is one of a handful of thriving fixed-based operators that have long-term leases for hangar and tarmac space at the airport.
But further development of private ground services at the Westchester airport, which also handles commercial flights, is sharply limited because of its proximity to densely populated residential neighborhoods in Westchester and in adjoining Fairfield County, Conn., said Salvatore J. Carrera, Westchester’s director for economic development.
Rents paid by fixed-base operators have risen sharply as a result