TAOS, N.M. (KRQE) – Year after year thousands more out-of-state tourists are flying into Taos for their world-class ski slopes. Now the northern New Mexico town says it needs a multi-million-dollar airport upgrade to keep up.
At a whopping 1,430 square feet inside and with bathrooms on the outside, the Taos Regional Airport’s tiny terminal building can handle just about 30 people today. But after years of talk town leaders are now preparing for some big upgrades starting with the terminal building. “So, we’re really happy that we got to this point that we found a contractor, that we have enough money to complete the project and that we finally get to break ground,” said Pascual Maestas, Mayor of Taos.
The idea got rolling in 2020 when Taos got more than $5 million in capital outlay funding to replace the facility, but construction was put on hold with COVID and rising costs. By 2021, NMDOT put $1.6 million into the $7 million dollar project that’s now fully funded. The upgrade is expected to help with overcrowding that’s common nowadays as a continued partnership with the airline JSX has funneled more non-stop flights to Taos from major cities like Denver, Dallas, San Diego, and Austin.
“The flights that we’ve been looking at are supportive of tourism but also we’ve been trying to look at flights locals can utilize,” said Mayor Maestas. The new terminal will be about 7,500 square feet which is five times the size of the old one but the mayor said Taos is not looking to become a big airport. “We’ve been working through our destination stewardship plan the past two years trying to find this balance between tourism and preserving what Taos is and preserving our culture,” said Mayor Maestas.
The airport will break ground on the new terminal building in two weeks with construction hopefully wrapping around October. The legislature has also earmarked $1.3 million for an airport parking lot project which is still in the works.