With Private Planes You Also Get Private Terminals

The boom in the use of business jets has started another phenomenon: luxurious private terminals for passengers and pilots are springing up across the nation.

At what were once remote airstrips for flying buffs, terminals that formerly provided little more than a fuel pump and a Quonset hut have turned into mini-resorts to compete for private jet customers, offering amenities from sleeping rooms and spas to frozen steaks, golf privileges and topless hostesses.

These businesses, called fixed base operators, or FBOs, have been around for decades, providing such basic services as fuel, hangar space, repairs and supplies for pilots.

Typically in the past, FBOs and their time-worn hangars were relegated to corners of airfields nearest the junkyards. At best, their excuse for a reception area was little more than a tacky office with castoff furniture and a tiny washroom with grease-stained towels.

Not anymore. Private terminals now are emerging as plush oases of comfort, security and efficiency and at key locations on the rims of runways.

Niceties are the norm, including complimentary mouthwash and elaborate floral arrangements in decorator-tile lavatories.

Dignitaries who have held court in hideaway conference rooms at Van Nuys and Burbank airports include President Clinton, Vice President Al Gore, former Gov. Pete Wilson, the secretary of defense, admirals and the president of Armenia.

The growing demand for such facilities has spawned fierce competition among base operators seeking a greater share of the clientele.

Stories abound about the incentives operators use to entice pilots to land and refuel at their executive terminals. Flower Aviation in Salina, Kan., hands out frozen Kansas City strip steaks to pilots.

Nowhere is the battle of the FBOs more evident than in Los Angeles, particularly in the San Fernando Valley. Van Nuys Airport, the busiest general aviation airport in the world, has six major base operators--more than any other airport in the nation, according to the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Assn. Five have built new or remodeled terminals.

Skytrails Aviation at Van Nuys keeps a spare set of golf clubs handy for pilots to use on the adjoining course. Media Aviation at Burbank, and others, provide complimentary “crew cars” to pilots and attendants.

“Service is the name of the game,” said the manager of one private terminal. “Whoever provides the greatest courtesies and little touches wins.”

Clay Lacy pioneered the concept of luxury terminals on the West Coast, emphasizing attention to pilot comforts, such as “snooze rooms,” which are now standard. Amenities built at Lacy’s Van Nuys terminal 17 years ago include a swimming pool, sauna and spa with music piped in.

“The real customer is the pilot,” said one Lacy employee. “He’s got the boss in the back of the airplane who pops for the bills, but he’s the one who makes the decisions” on which terminal to patronize.