It’s amazing what information comes unbidden on the Internet. Today an image of a long-gone airport appeared on my Facebook page. It seems that once upon a time there was an airport in Lancaster, CA, at 10th St W and Avenue I.
I lived in Lancaster 11 years and never knew there’d been an airport there.
In high school I passed by Quartz Hill airport all the time. I used to look down on it when I rode my Enduro on Quartz Hill. There were a few planes there, when I’d wander around in the late-'70s. I remember a Stearman rotting away, and a Cessna 180 (or was it a 185?). It’s all houses today. I wonder if anyone remembers it was there.
Austin, Texas has a couple of old airports that remain quite accessible.
Mueller Airport, northeast of downtown, is the site of a New Urbanist residential development. A few years ago, there were still many remnants of the old airport, including directional signage on abandoned roads that looped around overgrown parking lots.
Home to Canadair’s Plant 1, which was the original manufacturing site for the CL-215, CL-415, CL-600 and CRJ aircraft. Those facilitiies have moved to Mirabel (with the CL-600 and it’s sibling CL-300 now at Dorval (Trudeau) airport), and the airport grounds are now the Brois Franc neighbourhood of St. Laurent. Part of the lands were a country club for a while, known as Le Challenger… it is now being built over and only a reception hall of the same name remains.
Plant 1 remains on Marcel-Laurin as a components and subassembly manufacturing facility for Bombardier (who bought Canadair, of course), but no planes roll through her doors anymore.
If it weren’t for the Air Races, I imagine Reno-Stead would be covered in weeds by now. Other than the old Lear facility, I don’t know what goes on there.
Stone Mountain, GA had an airportuntil the Olympics came to town in 1996.
Here it is, about 1/2 mile ENE of the mountain itself.
I miss it, because it’s about 10 minutes from my house, and very convenient to run over, grab the plane and buzz the mountain on the way to goofing off for a bit.
Almost as good as living in an airport community, and not as much prop noise!
Roosevelt Field was the civilian airport that Charles Lindbergh flew from on his Trans-Atlantic Flight. It is now a huge Mall, although they try to keep a small aviation theme in the building.
Nearby Mitchell Air Force Base was closed in 1961. the land was given to Hofstra university, Nassau Community College, the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum, and various parks and museums. A small part of it still belongs to the military, and maintains housing, and exchange and a commissary for recruiters in Nassau County. I had been to “Mitchell Field” many times, without even realizing that some of the original runways, taxiways and parking aprons were still there. This Wiki page has a snapshot from Google maps that shows what is left of the base today. (I still don’t know how to link a specific map here)
San Fernando Airpark is now a Home Depot, Sam’s Club, a high school, and a swap meet. http://members.tripod.com/airfields_freeman/CA/Airfields_CA_SanFernan.htm#sanfernando
Very interesting place to fly in and out of.
On downwind you were headed right toward the foothills that rise almost to your altitude, on final you had to fly over the power lines that ran along Foothill Blvd at the end of the runway.
On takeoff you are looking at the brick wall of the building across Glenoaks Blvd. the faster you went the taller that building seemed to be.
It was still active when we moved to the neighborhood back in 1993, but finally closed in 2000. Airport Road is still there, and you can still make out where the runway used to be in Google Maps, and there are several aviation related street names (Amelia Earhart Ave, Spitfire Way, etc.) in the new subdivision that’s going in there now.
Is Meigs Field in Chicago too obvious? Perhaps it’s a bit recent to be called “forgotten” but using Google Maps to look at it, there’s very little sign that it used to be an airport.
I’ve read that my community used to have an airport with the runway and the hangars on opposite sides of the road. Unfortunately I’ve never found any pictures of this setup in operation. There’s absolutely no trace of it there now. A new airport was built in the 1950s and the area of the old airport is now covered with houses and businesses.
I’m only aware of one forgotten airport in the L.A. area, and perhaps the OP knows additional ones.
One time only, I remember looking at a map of L.A. that showed a “Howard Hughes Airport”. I really can’t remember where it was except that it might have been somewhere near to the 105 freeway’s route today, or the freeway might pass directly over where it used to be. IIRC it was more or less a narrow rectangle extending east and west with only one runway.
Santa Monica Airport was founded in 1915, or at least that’s when they leased the land. Some years later it was renamed to honor one Greayer Clover, a local kid who volunteered as an ambulance driver in the First World War and, while there, learned to fly, eventually perishing on a training flight before ever seeing battle. Today the name’s been forgotten except in the street name Cloverfield, a local thoroughfare. The 100-year lease is up in a couple of years, and it’s possible that it might not be renewed, so it might soon become an ex-airport.
Hancock Field in Santa Maria is now the site of Alan Hancock Community College. Some of the aircraft hangers and perhaps other buildings still exist, but when I drove past there a few months ago I remember thinking that now you wouldn’t know from the outside what they were originally unless you are pretty old. According to Wikipedia the field operated from 1929 to about 1959. I remember part of “The Spirit of St. Louis” starring Jimmy Stewart being filmed there in 1955-56. Airport Street was renamed College Avenue after the field was closed. I remember a school field trip to the National Weather Service office to watch them launch a weather balloon.
San Fernando Airpark was in the San Fernando valley.
Hughes field was located west of the San Diego (405) freeway and South if the Marina Freeway (90).
Pretty much due west of the Fox Hills mall. And several miles north of the 105 freeway.
In 1911 Saugus, MA (where I now live) turned the Old Saugus Race Track into one of the first airfields in New England. It was eventually named Atwood Park, and was the site of the first New England Air Mail. It was an early flying school location, and stsayed in operation until 1927, after which it reverted to being a racetrack. It was suggested for use as a dirigible base in 1940, but never used for that purpose.
Hughes Airport was north below the bluff where Loyola Marymount University is, south of Jefferson Blvd.
I started working near LAX in 1985, which is the year Hughes Airport closed, and moved to L.A. in 1987. I don’t recall ever seeing any aircraft operating there.
