10:00 PM PDT on Friday, July 9, 2010

By IMRAN GHORI
The Press-Enterprise

The runway at Rialto Municipal Airport is deserted, with no signs of airplanes landing or taxiing to takeoff.

The only activity is a San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department helicopter lifting off, a couple of mechanics working on an airplane in one of the hangars and three stray dogs running around.

In other words, it’s a typical morning at the airport, slated for closure several years ago to make way for development yet still open because the recession has put those plans on hold.

As a result, the airport is stuck preparing for closure, but no one knows when.

“It’s in a holding pattern waiting for the market to recover,” said Rich Scanlan, Rialto’s aviation director.

Few business tenants

The airport, which has no control tower, doesn’t keep track of takeoffs and landings. But Scanlan estimates about 30,000 a year. Half of the users are helicopters from the airport’s two busiest tenants, the Sheriff’s Department aviation unit and Mercy Air ambulance service.

The airport was opened on 60 acres in 1947 by Sam Miro. The city purchased it in 1967, looking at it as an economic catalyst along with the rumored 210 freeway.

The city expanded the airport over the years, but it took more than 40 years for the freeway to come to town. By that point, Rialto’s airport was overshadowed by airports in Ontario and San Bernardino, and city officials determined that the land was more valuable if developed for other purposes.

“The freeway was kind of the birth of the airport, and now it’s kind of the death of the airport,” Scanlan said.

Congress approved the airport closure in 2005. City officials approved plans for a project called Renaissance Rialto that was to include about 2,000 homes, 14.7 million square feet of industrial space and retail centers along the newly built Highway 210 to the north.

Renaissance Rialto developer Lewis-Hillwood LLC agreed to purchase the 450-acre airport to become part of its 1,500-acre development. Tenants would get moving costs, with most expected to go to San Bernardino International Airport.

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