ROANOKE, Va. – Just in time for the holiday travel season, Roanoke’s airport opened its new car rental facility on Tuesday.
The airport’s marketing and air service development director Bradley Boettcher said that before the new development, getting a rental car seemed disjointed as the cars were parked in the long-term lot and the rental counters were in the terminal.
The more than $6 million project includes a vestibule, a lobby with four rental car counters, restrooms and a new reconfigured parking lot, which can hold up nearly 200 rental cars.
Before the coronavirus pandemic, Boettcher said they would rent out about 100 to 150 cars a day.
He said with less business travel and the pandemic, their traffic numbers are cut in half, although hopes traffic will pick back up to reach those numbers again.
Boettcher said the facility was supposed to open earlier this fall to take advantage of both the college and football traffic, but the pandemic caused delays.
He said the airport is currently averaging 40% of last year’s traffic and he hopes the holidays can provide a little boost to their revenue.
The year and a half construction project was funded by car rental customer facility charges.