Phoenix-Mesa Gateway Airport can't fix a possible safety issue, thanks to the D.C. swamp

Opinion: The airport needs a taller air-traffic control tower, but an archaic federal rule won't let them build it. And Congress won't step in to fix it.

Joanna Allhands
The Republic |
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Phoenix-Mesa Gateway Airport's control tower was built by the U.S. Air Force in 1970.

Let me tell you a ridiculous story about how The Swamp in Washington, D.C., makes everything needlessly difficult.

Phoenix-Mesa Gateway Airport needs a taller, larger control tower.

The 106-foot one they have now was built in 1970, when the airport was still an Air Force base.

The tower is too short to see what’s happening on the north end of the airport apron, where Cessna’s operations are, and air-traffic controllers have a hard time determining whether planes flying in from the south are lined up with the correct runway.

The Federal Aviation Administration says that’s a potential safety hazard.

They can only use $2 million of their money

What’s more, the tower wasn’t built to house the air-traffic controllers the airport needs to support nearly 300,000 flights (and growing) a year. It’s a five-person crew now. Yet there are only four work stations, which means the supervisor can’t listen in on air traffic without unplugging one of the other controllers' headsets first.

The tower is rickety, with no sprinklers in case of a fire and an outdated elevator that doesn’t even reach the floor where the controllers work. The place leaks when it storms.

It’s outlived its useful life. Replacing it is the airport’s top priority – and has been for years.

So, good news! Gateway has the money it needs to do the work, using funds the feds allocate to airports based on traffic to make infrastructure improvements.

But here’s the problem: The 165-foot tower the FAA wants Gateway to build is projected to cost up to $20 million. (Actually, if the FAA built it, it could cost up to $25 million. But more on that in a second.)

There’s a federal rule that prohibits airports like Gateway from using more than $2 million to build an air-control tower. 

And the only way to get around it is to convince Congress to raise the limit.  

The solution lies with Congress

Mesa has been pleading for years with the feds and Arizona’s congressional delegation to make that happen. And, more frustrating, everyone agrees with Mesa that the cap should reflect the reality of what it costs to build a tower these days.

But the FAA reauthorization bill that contains that provision remains stuck in the Senate, held up by infighting over whether the FAA should even exist. And, what’s more, the Senate only doubled the limit to $4 million, which obviously doesn’t solve Mesa’s problem.

So, to recap: Gateway handles more traffic than 90 percent of all towered airports, according to an analysis completed by the airport. Its unique mix of airline, corporate, training, military and cargo flights make it the 34th busiest airport in the nation.

If the FAA owned the tower, it probably would have already been rebuilt, and at a potentially higher expense than what Mesa is planning to build.

But because Gateway owns the tower – it came with the base once the Air Force vacated – the $2 million construction limit applies. Making it impossible for Mesa to build anything at all.

Why can't D.C. fix anything?

And no, in case you’re wondering, it's politically improbable for the FAA to take ownership of the tower, given that some members of Congress and the president already want to privatize air-traffic control.

Other attempts to make the rule change outside of the FAA reauthorization framework have failed, as have attempts to create a public-private partnership to fund the tower.

No wonder. Gateway already has the money. It just doesn’t have the federal blessing to spend it.

That’s what gets me: This is such a simple fix.

But because of infighting, grandstanding or just dumb bureaucracy, no one in D.C. can seem to make it happen.

Reach Allhands at



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