A new investment in a Mobile airport facility could represent an important puzzle piece of the city’s aerospace future.

This week, the Mobile Airport Authority discussed a company’s plan not just to rent a World War II-era hangar, but to invest in “significant improvements.” The company likely will put $2 million to $2.5 million into the facility, which it will then rent to as-yet unidentified new tenants.

What makes the deal special is that the property involved isn’t at the Brookley Aeroplex, a site strongly associated with the 1940s war effort. It’s on the campus of Mobile Regional Airport in west Mobile.

The airport authority is building a new international terminal at Brookley Field, which is much closer to downtown and which provides far better interstate access for travelers. Upon its completion – currently projected for fall 2026 – commercial passenger traffic will shift from west Mobile to Brookley.

While backers say the swap will make Mobile much more competitive with other airports in the region, it does raise the question of how the potential of the west Mobile airfield will be used once passenger planes start flying into Brookley.

To have an outside company like Florida-based PPK Investment Group already booking space at Regional is “really exciting,” said Luckett Robinson, leader of the Mobile Airport Authority board. It also addresses a challenge he’s discussed with Mobile Mayor Sandy Stimpson, he said.

“As chairman of the board, that is one of the things that I’ve told Sandy is going to be a big job in the next five years,” he said. “And that is reworking Regional for noncommercial aircraft uses. I mean, we’ve got our fixed base operations out there, we’ve got the Coast Guard out there, we have Airbus [Airbus U.S. Military Aircraft] out there, but we will need to find a lot more of those kinds of entities to relocate there.

“The good news is, there aren’t a lot of big airports like that, that have the real estate to really develop.”

“For us it was really exciting that a company like PPK was interested in this site,” continued Robinson. “I look at it as one of the first steps in bringing those kinds of important businesses to Regional. The airport authority, we have two missions. The first mission is to provide commercial air service to the greater South Alabama area. But our second mission is to become the leading aeronautical business hub in the United States. Airbus has propelled us rapidly to achieving that mission. But we’ve got to do it at both airports and you know, it’s exciting that PPK was interested in the other airport.”

The hangar in question isn’t as big as the cavernous Brookley facilities that Steven Spielberg once rented to film parts of “Close Encounters of the Third Kind.” It sits to the southeast of Regional’s runways. Passersby on Airport Boulevard might catch a glimpse of it behind a city fire station adjacent to the airfield. Robinson said it’s in the ballpark of 24,000 square feet. But it comes with key amenities such as ramp connections to the runways and plenty of aircraft parking space.

He said that at the height of the WWII effort, air traffic was so heavy at Brookley that some operations, such as training flights and some commercial flights, were pushed to what was then known as Bates Field. The hangar at Regional is a remnant of those days.

Robinson said the board authorized him to finalize and sign the lease deal at a meeting on Tuesday. He said he expects PPK to move quickly to start renovations. A timeline for their completion and the arrival of PPK’s first sublease tenant wasn’t yet definite, he said.

A rendering provided by Robinson shows the hangar bearing the logo of AirBOSS Hangars, a company that offers leases on corporate hangars and aircraft maintenance facilities.

Meanwhile, Robinson said, “we have more interest in Brookley than we probably have space.”

He attended the Paris Air Show earlier this year along with other Mobile Airport Authority personnel and city representatives, part of a larger Alabama delegation.