Texarkana Regional Airport Authority Board members accepted nearly $420,000 in Federal Aviation Administration grant funds during a special meeting Thursday.
The money will be used to design an apron upon which passenger jet aircraft will be parked once the airport's proposed new $15 million, 37,000-square-foot passenger terminal gets built. The designing and engineering work on the apron is estimated to take about six to eight months, and construction will take place sometime in 2021.
Construction of the terminal itself, which is already in it design phase, could likely be in either the latter part of next year or in the early part of 2020, Airport Director Mark Mellinger said.
Besides accepting the grant, the board's finance committee reviewed the airport's Calendar Year $1.2 million operations and maintenance budget for 2019. The budget will have to be presented to Texarkana, Texas, and Texarkana Ark,. city officials during the next few months for final approval.