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December 23 2009 - Slideshows

Wireless Access Control Retrofit Cuts Cost of TSA Security Mandate

The facility averages three daily flight operations by Atlantic Southeast Airlines and more than 30,000 GA operations annually. After the mandate's enactment, Patti Clark, Ph.D., executive director and airport manager, spent several months searching for new access control and ID equipment. "Our GA clientele tended to direct their anger at the messenger instead of the message, and many threatened to take their business to other airports," Clark says. While the challenge seemed insurmountable at the onset for the 800-acre airport, creative ideas from an access control/security provider combined with cutting-edge wireless technology helped make the security retrofit affordable and fast track the installation to avoid TSA fines.

When a recent Transportation Security Administration (TSA) mandate introduced new requirements for activity monitoring and identifying General Aviation (GA) personnel with unescorted airport access, Valdosta Regional Airport (VLD) found itself in an underfunded race against time to retrofit its access control/security system.

Like most Class-3 airports, VLD was not only underfunded, but its GA clientele was infuriated at TSA's December 2008 mandate, Security Directive (SD) 1542-08G, which is directed mainly toward GA areas at commercial service airports. After eight years of successful post-9/11 security measures for commercial aviation, the TSA is now tightening security in other airport areas such as GA with mandatory background checks and ID media issuances to all pilot and personnel with unescorted access to airport operations areas.

All Photos Courtesy of Matrix Systems, Dayton, Ohio

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