A clear sky. Low 53F. Winds SW at 5 to 10 mph..

A clear sky. Low 53F. Winds SW at 5 to 10 mph.

A clear sky. Low 53F. Winds SW at 5 to 10 mph..

A clear sky. Low 53F. Winds SW at 5 to 10 mph.

SPEARFISH — With the completion of a taxi lane extension on its eastern end, Clyde Ice Field at the Black Hills Airport is seeing an uptick in private hangers coming in.

“They’re all privately owned but they’re on leased ground that they lease from the city,” Jilek said.”(That’s) typically a pretty big commitment from an owner’s standpoint.

Depending on size of the hanger and the type of facilities the owner requires, Jilek said the cost of building a new hanger could run high.

“The last big hanger that we built out here was over a million dollars,” he said.

That 100-foot by 100-foot hanger was built around four years ago.

With almost a dozen private hangers already occupying the airport, Jilek said the taxi lane expansion would allow up to six more on the property. But that won’t be the end of the airports expansion plans.

“We’ve got a master plan in place that kind of provides for the orderly development of the entire property out here,” Jilek said. “We’ve got a lot of room left.”

The city owns several hangers that it rents to aircraft owners, but Jilek said those spots are all currently full with a waiting list to get in.

“We’re seeing aircraft anywhere from $1 million, probably to $30-plus million, and that’s not something your gonna leave set out with the type of weather conditions we get through here,” he explained.

Jilek said the facility is able to handle aircraft up to a mid-sized corporate jet, and with so many companies choosing to locate in the Black Hills-Clyde Ice Field is an ideal location to fly into.

“These people don’t want to be driving into Rapid City,” he said. “There’s nothing in Rapid City that we can’t provide here for the private owner.”

Jilek said he thinks the continued interest in and growth at the airport is directly linked to the overall community growth throughout the area.

“People moving out of the urban areas that figured out, especially after COVID that you don’t have to be working in an office building,” he said. “With a little internet service, ‘I can be at home anywhere.’’

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