Moore County Airport Receives $2.5 Million Grant for Taxi Lane Expansion and Corporate Hangar Development

Moore County Airport (KSOP) has been awarded a $2.5 million Airport Economic Development Grant through the North Carolina Department of Transportation's Airports Economic Development Fund. The funding will support expansion of taxi lanes serving new corporate hangars currently under construction, along with development of additional hangar capacity to meet growing demand.

Airport officials said the improvements are expected to facilitate hangar construction associated with the creation of more than 75 aviation jobs. Pat Molamphy, at-large member of the North Carolina Board of Transportation, said, "Airports like Moore County Airport are critical drivers of economic development across North Carolina. These investments strengthen local communities by supporting business growth, attracting private investment, and creating high-quality jobs." Adam Kiker, chairman of the Moore County Airport Authority, said, "We are truly thankful to DOT's leadership and all those involved with this grant award. The funding allows us to support businesses that want to invest in our community and positions us to serve future economic development activity in Moore County."

The grant comes amid broader expansion efforts at KSOP, including ongoing hangar development, construction of a new fixed base operator terminal, and pursuit of restored commercial air service to Moore County. The Airports Economic Development Fund is a performance-based program providing grants to North Carolina general aviation airports for time-sensitive capital improvement projects tied to private investment and job creation; since its creation in 2017, the program has funded projects expected to generate more than $224 million in additional investment across the state. Owned by Moore County and operated by the Moore County Airport Authority, KSOP serves corporate and private aviation, military activity, flight training, aircraft maintenance, charter operations and other aviation businesses, reports generating more than $140 million in annual economic output, and traces its history to 1929, having previously supported scheduled commercial airline service until 2001.

This grant illustrates how state economic development funds increasingly underwrite general aviation infrastructure directly tied to job creation rather than general airfield upkeep, with the funding scoped narrowly to taxi lanes and hangars serving specific corporate tenants already under construction.

For general aviation airports pursuing hangar demand from corporate and charter operators, this shows how public capital can be sequenced alongside private investment: the state fund is performance-based, meaning the $2.5 million was tied to a defined outcome of more than 75 jobs rather than disbursed against a general capital plan. That structure lets an airport authority move ahead of full private financing on infrastructure like taxi lanes that a hangar tenant needs before occupying space.

What happens next at KSOP will depend on how the new FBO terminal construction and the pursuit of restored commercial air service progress alongside this hangar buildout, since all three efforts point toward the same underlying goal of expanding the airport's role beyond its current corporate, military, training and maintenance activity.