61-4-3 - Legislative findings and declarations.
§ 61-4-3. Legislative findings and declarations.
The Legislature hereby finds and declares that:
(a) There exists in the State of Mississippi a continuing need for gainful employment for the citizens of this state.
(b) The concept of building four (4) to six (6) giant, new airports in remote or sparsely populated areas of the country for connecting operations in order to take the pressure off capacity-troubled metropolitan airports is gaining increasing support from a variety of aviation officials, including the Federal Aviation Administration. Such facilities, called "wayports," would cater to connecting and transit traffic, leaving capacity-constrained airports such as Atlanta, St. Louis and Chicago available for increased origin-and-destination traffic. The airports would have 15,000-foot-long runways and be ideal ports for 21st Century air traffic and modern aircraft.
(c) Air space over state-owned land at Parchman, Mississippi, is free of air traffic patterns, making the location ideal for such a "wayport" in the Southeast. Congress soon will order the U.S. Department of Transportation to study the concept, and then, if approved, to fund much of the airports' costs with the financially sound Federal Aviation Trust Fund.
(d) The Delta's rural, state-owned land at Parchman and central location could make Mississippi among the most attractive sites for a wayport. Most of the sprawling state-owned land in Sunflower County is rented out for farming. As selling points, there are existing highway systems, such as U.S. 49 W. and Mississippi 32, and plenty of land that would not require much preparation for development.
(e) The wayport concept is a tremendous opportunity to ask the U.S. Congress to recognize the economic problems of rural areas.
Sources: Laws, 1989, ch. 535, § 2, eff from and after passage (approved April 17, 1989).