Chelan-Douglas Regional Port Authority looks to provide ground transport solutions for Pangborn Airport travelers

WENATCHEE VALLEY—The Chelan-Douglas Regional Port Authority (CDRPA) is seeking to improve Pangborn Airport’s limited ground transportation options, more efficiently connecting the vital airport’s nearby communities to the rest of the world.

The drive to improve the airport's ground transportation options follows the formation of a temporary Air Service Task Force, an entity designed to investigate Pangborn’s needs and establish strategic priorities to meet them. 

CDRPA Director of Airports Trent Moyers described the important questions that the Air Service Task Force is formed to address.

“What’s the level of service that we want to provide here,” he asked, “and how do we go about doing that? What are the challenges that we need to face and overcome? Some of them are financial challenges, some of them are operational challenges, but that’s really the goal, to look at the level of service we want to be able to provide.” 

With Air Service Task Force strategic priorities 1 and 2 focusing on the need to recruit flight carriers with more frequent and more affordable flights, strategic priority 3 centers around a major missing piece within the local region as a whole, ground transportation to and from the airport. This issue is especially prominent for travelers arriving at Pangborn Airport late at night and early in the morning, times when on-site car rental businesses are closed.  

In the hopes of confronting this issue and providing travelers with a more convenient means of connecting to NCW communities, CDRPA members plan to meet directly with the airport’s on-site Enterprise and Hertz rental agencies and discuss late-night/early morning service options.

“We’ll be meeting with the two different car rental companies that are out here,” Director Moyers mentioned. “Enterprise and Hertz, in the following week to chat about their operations and see how we can all provide a service that their customers are expecting as well.” 

The Air Service Task Force isn’t solely focused on car rentals. As CDRPA CEO Jim Kuntz explains, the drive to improve Pangborn’s ground transit services is multilayered and aims to help both long-distance travelers and those staying in the local area.

“We have a two pronged approach,” CEO Kuntz revealed, “one [component] is trying to get the car rental agency counters to be open at midnight, so that people [arriving on a late flight] that want to rent a car have that option. Today that option doesn’t exist. The second component is flyers that might be coming into the valley who don’t want to rent a car, but they’re trying to get to a hotel, and how do they do that?” 

In looking for ways to tackle these issues, the CDRPA board considered various options including the use of Uber or other gig services. However, commissioners raised concerns about the major lack of drivers for these services in the local area, especially during the late and early hours of the day.  

“And so the question is,” Kuntz proposed, “can we work with a taxi group or some type of transportation where we would know there would be some options available for the travelers coming into the valley?”

Overall, the CDRPA aims to boost Pangborn’s local convenience and dependability, cementing the airport as a vital resource for the local region, an airport locals want to fly out of. 

“What we want to do is encourage people to fly out of Wenatchee,” Kunts shared. “And people fly airports that are convenient and cost effective, so we need to position Pangborn as being cost effective and convenient.” 

Pursuing this massive undertaking, the CDRPA’s major goal is to use Pangborn Airport to connect its local NCW communities to the world.  

As Director Moyers shares, “The key word is ‘connected.’ So, connectivity is what’s important, if the flights don’t line up from here to Seattle to get you connected to the rest of the world, that can be a problem.”

For more information about the Chelan-Douglas Regional Port Authority and its many ambitious projects, visit cdrpa.org. 

Will Nilles: (509) 731-3211 or will@ward.media