Airports
FAA’s Bedford, Lawmakers Oppose Burke Lakefront Closure
Neither FAA nor Congress appear open to helping Cleveland expedite airport closure
Burke Lakefront Airport on the shores of Lake Erie in Cleveland
Cleveland's City Council will review new studies examining the potential impacts of the closure of Burke Lakefront Airport. © GRALISTAIR, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford weighed in on the push to close Cleveland Burke Lakefront Airport (KBKL), telling a local television news station that the agency is against closing airports around the country. “We need to talk about how do we open new facilities—not how do we close existing, valuable real estate?” he told the ABC affiliate while on a tour of the Cleveland Air Route Traffic Control Center in Oberlin, Ohio, on Friday.

The administrator’s response came as Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb has called for the airport’s closure, saying it loses $1.7 million a year. Bibb has a vision of turning the land into a lakefront recreational area, as well as repurposing it for economic development. The airport, which is built largely on man-made landfill on the edge of Lake Erie, opened in 1947.

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