Martin State Airport is a joint civil-military public use

airport An airport is an aerodrome with extended facilities, mostly for commercial air transport. Airports usually consists of a landing area, which comprises an aerially accessible open space including at least one operationally active surface ...

located nine nautical miles (10 mi, 17 km) east of the

central business district A central business district (CBD) is the commercial and business centre of a city. It contains commercial space and offices, and in larger cities will often be described as a financial district. Geographically, it often coincides with the "city ...

Baltimore Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the List of municipalities in Maryland, most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, and List of United States cities by popula ...

, in

Baltimore County Baltimore County ( , locally: or ) is the third-most populous county in the U.S. state of Maryland and is part of the Baltimore metropolitan area. Baltimore County (which partially surrounds, though does not include, the independent City of ...

Maryland Maryland ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It shares borders with Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware and the Atlantic Ocean to ...

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

. The facility is located within the census-designated place of Middle River on Maryland State Highway 150 (Eastern Boulevard), near the intersection of Maryland State Highway 700 (Martin Boulevard). The

Maryland Aviation Administration The Maryland Aviation Administration (MAA) is a state agency of Maryland and an airport authority under the jurisdiction of the Maryland Department of Transportation. The agency owns and operates Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marsha ...

operates the airport on behalf of the

Maryland Department of Transportation The Maryland Department of Transportation (MDOT) is an organization comprising five business units and one Authority: * Maryland Transportation Authority (Transportation Secretary serves as chairman of the Maryland Transportation Authority) * ...

. MTN is a general aviation relief airport.

History

This was the former plant airport for the Glenn L. Martin Company which produced a large number of military aircraft at this location between the 1920s and 1960s. The Glenn L. Martin Maryland Aviation Museum and old seaplane ramps are located at the southeast corner of the airport. In 1937, Glen Martin proposed height restrictions around the airport because a new generation of large, heavy transports would be flying from its seaplane base. By 1945, Martin had built $5.5 million in structures on the field. The company attempted to sell the property to the City of Baltimore for $1 million, but the commissioner Robert O'Boneell said there was insufficient room for expansion. In 1974, Governor

Marvin Mandel Marvin Mandel (April 19, 1920 – August 30, 2015) was an American politician and lawyer who served as the 56th Governor of Maryland from January 7, 1969, to January 17, 1979, including a one-and-a-half-year period when Lt. Governor Blair ...

proposed to purchase the airport from Martin Marietta. The company formed a real-estate arm, Chesapeake Park Inc., with the former Baltimore County Council Chair Herry J. Bartenfelder to build residential and commercial real estate. Citizens of Essex opposed the use conversion, lending support to the State's purchase of the field for $9.4 million. In 1980, Port-A-Port

T-Hangar {{Refimprove, date=January 2011 A Tee hangar is a type of enclosed structure designed to hold aircraft in protective storage, and their shape takes advantage of the shape of most general aviation aircraft where the main wings are longer than the ...

s were purchased for general aviation use and lease. In the 1990s the airport was targeted as part of the Middle River Employment Center district to have MD route 43 highway extended from I-95 direct to the terminal through a series of wetland parcels.

Military use

The

Maryland Air National Guard The Maryland Air National Guard (MD ANG) is the aerial militia of the State of Maryland, United States of America, and a reserve component of the United States Air Force. It is, along with the Maryland Army National Guard, an element of the Maryla ...

's 175th Wing is a tenant activity at MTN with locally based

A-10C The Fairchild Republic A-10 Thunderbolt II is a single-seat, twin-turbofan, straight-wing, subsonic attack aircraft developed by Fairchild Republic for the United States Air Force (USAF). In service since 1976, it is named for the Republ ...

aircraft. The Air National Guard facility is located on the northeast side of the field and is officially named Warfield Air National Guard Base.

Facilities and aircraft

Martin State Airport covers an area of at an

elevation The elevation of a geographic location is its height above or below a fixed reference point, most commonly a reference geoid, a mathematical model of the Earth's sea level as an equipotential gravitational surface (see Geodetic datum § Vert ...

of 21 feet (6 m) above

mean sea level There are several kinds of mean in mathematics, especially in statistics. Each mean serves to summarize a given group of data, often to better understand the overall value (magnitude and sign) of a given data set. For a data set, the '' ari ...

. It has one

asphalt Asphalt, also known as bitumen (, ), is a sticky, black, highly viscous liquid or semi-solid form of petroleum. It may be found in natural deposits or may be a refined product, and is classed as a pitch. Before the 20th century, the term ...

paved

runway According to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), a runway is a "defined rectangular area on a land aerodrome prepared for the landing and takeoff of aircraft". Runways may be a man-made surface (often asphalt concrete, as ...

designated 15/33 which is 6,997 by 180 feet (2,132 x 55 m). It also had one helipad with a 65 by 65 ft (20 x 20 m)

concrete Concrete is a composite material composed of fine and coarse aggregate bonded together with a fluid cement (cement paste) that hardens (cures) over time. Concrete is the second-most-used substance in the world after water, and is the most wi ...

surface. For the 12-month period ending October 6, 2010, the airport had 69,193 aircraft operations, an average of 189 per day: 91%

general aviation General aviation (GA) is defined by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) as all civil aviation aircraft operations with the exception of commercial air transport or aerial work, which is defined as specialized aviation services ...

, 6%

military A military, also known collectively as armed forces, is a heavily armed, highly organized force primarily intended for warfare. It is typically authorized and maintained by a sovereign state, with its members identifiable by their distinct ...

, and 3%

air taxi An air taxi is a small commercial aircraft that makes short flights on demand. In 2001 air taxi operations were promoted in the United States by a NASA and aerospace industry study on the potential Small Aircraft Transportation System (SATS) ...

. At that time there were 218 aircraft based at this airport: 64% single-

engine An engine or motor is a machine designed to convert one or more forms of energy into mechanical energy. Available energy sources include potential energy (e.g. energy of the Earth's gravitational field as exploited in hydroelectric power ...

, 14% multi-engine, 6% jet, 5%

helicopter A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning rotors. This allows the helicopter to take off and land vertically, to hover, and to fly forward, backward and laterally. These attributes ...

and 11%

Operations

Martin State Airport serves a wide variety of general aviation and commercial operators. Martin State is home base to many helicopter operations including local news helicopters WJZ Channel 13 and WBAL Channel 11; Medevac services Express Care 1 and Helicopter Transport Services; and the aviation units for the

Maryland State Police The Maryland State Police (MSP), officially the Maryland Department of State Police (MDSP), is the official state police force of the U.S. state of Maryland. The Maryland State Police is headquartered at 1201 Reisterstown Road in the Pikesvill ...

Baltimore County Police The Baltimore County Police Department is the primary law enforcement agency for Baltimore County, Maryland. They have been accredited by Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies (C.A.L.E.A.) since 1984. Police chief The cur ...

, and the Baltimore City Police. There is a wide variety of flight training activities at the airport's three flight schools: Middle River Aviation, First Class Flight Academy, and Brett Aviation.Brett Aviation
/ref>

Cargo operations

References

External links

Martin State Airport

Martin Airport on Google Street View

Aerial photo as of 8 April 1994
from

USGS The United States Geological Survey (USGS), formerly simply known as the Geological Survey, is a scientific agency of the United States government. The scientists of the USGS study the landscape of the United States, its natural resources, a ...

The National Map ''The National Map'' is a collaborative effort of the United States Geological Survey (USGS) and other federal, state, and local agencies to improve and deliver topographic information for the United States. The purpose of the effort is to pro ...

'' * * {{Authority control Airports in Maryland Transportation buildings and structures in Baltimore County, Maryland