Branson Airport is a public use

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

located eight nautical miles (15 km) south-southeast of the

central business district A central business district (CBD) is the Commerce, commercial and business center 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 wit ...

of Branson, a city in Taney County,

Missouri Missouri (''see #Etymology and pronunciation, pronunciation'') is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. Ranking List of U.S. states and territories by area, 21st in land area, it border ...

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

. Branson Airport, LLC is a private company operating the airport through an operating agreement with The Branson Regional Airport Transportation District. The airport is owned by Taney County. Branson Airport’s three-letter

location identifier A location identifier is a symbolic representation for the name and the location of an airport, navigation aid, or weather station, and is used for staffed air traffic control facilities in air traffic control, telecommunications, computer program ...

for

IATA The International Air Transport Association (IATA ) is an airline trade association founded in 1945. IATA has been described as a cartel since, in addition to setting technical standards for airlines, IATA also organized tariff conferences tha ...

, is BKG, and the three-letter location identifier from the FAA is BBG. The airport opened on May 11, 2009. In 2023, only private airlines were operating passenger service into the airfield. , no scheduled passenger service is available at the airport. There is one FBO on the field, named the Branson Jet Center. One restaurant is located at the airport. The restaurant is open to the public and is located at the Branson Jet Center.

Opening

Prior to construction of Branson Airport, the closest commercial service airport was Springfield-Branson National Airport northwest of Branson. The formal grand opening was May 8–10, 2009, during which the

U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds The USAF Air Demonstration Squadron is the air demonstration squadron of the United States Air Force The Thunderbirds, as they are popularly known, are assigned to the 57th Wing, and are based at Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada. Created in 1953 ...

performed during an air show. The first scheduled passenger flight arrived the following day, on May 11, 2009 from Minneapolis-St. Paul Airport operated by

Sun Country Airlines Sun Country Airlines is an ultra-low cost airline in the United States. Based at Minneapolis–Saint Paul International Airport with headquarters on airport property, Sun Country operates to about 140 destinations in the United States, Canad ...

with a

Boeing 737 The Boeing 737 is an American narrow-body aircraft, narrow-body aircraft produced by Boeing at its Boeing Renton Factory, Renton factory in Washington (state), Washington. Developed to supplement the Boeing 727 on short and thin routes, the t ...

jetliner. There were two airlines operating at the time of Branson's opening,

AirTran Airways AirTran Airways was a low-cost airline in the United States that operated from 1993 until it was acquired by Southwest Airlines May 2, 2011. Headquartered in Orlando, Florida, AirTran Airways was established in 1993 as Conquest Sun Airlines b ...

and

. Besides AirTran and Sun Country, the airport has been served by

Frontier Airlines Frontier Airlines, Inc. is a major American ultra low-cost airline headquartered in Denver, Colorado. It operates flights to over 120 destinations in the United States, Caribbean, Mexico and Central America, and employs more than 5,000 staff. ...

and

Southwest Airlines Southwest Airlines Co., or simply Southwest, is a Major airlines of the United States, major airline in the United States that formerly operated on a low-cost carrier model. It is headquartered in the Love Field, Dallas, Love Field neighborhood ...

as well as several regional air carriers.

Flight history

launched flights to Branson Airport with daily service to Denver as well as less than daily service to Milwaukee, which was formerly served from Branson through AirTran.

ExpressJet ExpressJet Airlines was a regional airline in the United States that operated from 1987 until 2022. It was headquartered in College Park, Georgia. The company began as Britt Airways and flew exclusively as Continental Express, the contracte ...

also operated flights under an independent brand known as

Branson Air Express FlyBranson Travel, LLC, branded as Branson Air Express, is a defunct air travel marketing brand, based at Branson Airport near Branson, Missouri. Branson AirExpress used the air carrier services of DOT and FAA certificated airlines such as Elit ...

to several markets utilizing

Embraer ERJ-145 The Embraer ERJ family (for Embraer Regional Jet) are regional jets designed and produced by the Brazilian aerospace company Embraer. The family includes the ERJ 135 (37 passengers), ERJ 140 (44 passengers), and ERJ 145 (50 passen ...

regional jets supporting

point-to-point transit Point-to-point transit is a transportation system in which a plane, bus, or train travels directly to a destination, rather than going through a central Transport hub, hub. This differs from the spoke-hub distribution paradigm in which the transp ...

. On February 23, 2011, Branson Airport's largest carrier at the time,

, announced additional flights from Branson to

Baltimore Baltimore is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland. With a population of 585,708 at the 2020 census and estimated at 568,271 in 2024, it is the 30th-most populous U.S. city. The Baltimore metropolitan area is the 20th-large ...

, Chicago-Midway and Houston-Hobby. All flights were announced to be year round service. As of August, 2012, Branson Airport was served with six nonstop departures a day with more than 100 possible connections. On August 27, 2012,

announced service to Branson and started service on March 9, 2013. Southwest flew

jetliners nonstop to Chicago-Midway, Dallas-Love, Houston-Hobby and previously flew Saturday only flights to Orlando–International. Southwest Airlines then ended all service into the airport on June 7, 2014. On February 24, 2014,

announced their expansion of Branson to Denver service on June 9, 2014. Seasonal service ended in October 2014. Frontier Airlines returned to Branson in the spring of 2018, having served the Branson market for a number of years since the airport opened in 2009. On April 3, 2014, Buzz Airways, announced new nonstop service to both Chicago-Midway and Houston-Hobby airports that began June 12, 2014, replacing the lost Southwest Airlines service. As of December 2014, this service was operated by

Elite Airways Elite Airways was an airline based in the United States that operated charter and scheduled passenger flights. The airline was headquartered in Portland, Maine. History Elite Airways LLC was founded in 2006 and received FAA Part 121 scheduled ...

with

Canadair CRJ The Bombardier CRJ100 and CRJ200 (previously Canadair CRJ100 and CRJ200) are regional jets designed and manufactured by Bombardier Aerospace between 1991 and 2006, the first of the Bombardier CRJ family. The ''Canadair Regional Jet'' (CRJ) pro ...

regional jet aircraft. Service to Chicago-Midway has since terminated. On December 23, 2014, Branson AirExpress announced flights operated by Elite Airways and Buzz Airways will continue in 2015 to Chicago-Midway, (MDW) Houston-Hobby (HOU), Austin (AUS) and Denver (DEN). On January 28, 2015, Branson AirExpress announced it would add an additional operator, Orange Air, flying

McDonnell Douglas MD-80 The McDonnell Douglas MD-80 is a series of five-abreast single-aisle airliners developed by McDonnell Douglas. It was produced by the developer company until August 1997 and then by Boeing Commercial Airplanes. The MD-80 was the second gener ...

jetliners nonstop to Cincinnati (CVG) and New Orleans (MSY) with direct, one stop service to Cancun, Mexico (CUN) via New Orleans from the Branson Airport starting May 6, 2015. On October 5, 2015 the Cincinnati leg of the Orange Air route was terminated, and the Branson-New Orleans-Cancun portion of the route was transferred to

. Elite Airways and Buzz Airways returned as the scheduled air service providers in 2016. In 2017, the sole provider was

Via Air Via Airlines was a US domestic regional airline offering scheduled service across the United States. The airline originally focused on scheduled Essential Air Service from Raleigh County Memorial Airport in Beckley, West Virginia, Parkersburg/M ...

, operating

Embraer EMB-145 The Embraer ERJ family (for Embraer Regional Jet) are regional jets designed and produced by the Brazilian aerospace company Embraer. The family includes the ERJ 135 (37 passengers), ERJ 140 (44 passengers), and ERJ 145 (50 passen ...

regional jets to several destinations. In October 2019, the airline declared bankruptcy and ceased all operations. In February 2018,

announced it was returning to Branson with seasonal service to Denver (DEN) beginning June 13, 2018. However in 2023, Frontier announced they would not serve the airport for the coming season.

Facilities and aircraft

Branson Airport covers an area of at an

elevation The elevation of a geographic location (geography), ''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 equipotenti ...

of 1,302 feet (397 m) above

mean sea level A mean is a quantity representing the "center" of a collection of numbers and is intermediate to the extreme values of the set of numbers. There are several kinds of means (or "measures of central tendency") in mathematics, especially in statist ...

. It has one

runway In aviation, a runway is an elongated, rectangular surface designed for the landing and takeoff of an aircraft. Runways may be a human-made surface (often asphalt concrete, asphalt, concrete, or a mixture of both) or a natural surface (sod, ...

designated 14/32 with a

concrete Concrete is a composite material composed of aggregate bound together with a fluid cement that cures to a solid over time. It is the second-most-used substance (after water), the most–widely used building material, and the most-manufactur ...

surface measuring 7,140 by 150 feet (2,176 x 46 m).

Airline and destination

Sun Country Airlines was the last airline to provide scheduled service to Branson Airport, offering flights to Minneapolis/St. Paul on a seasonal basis. Service to Branson discontinued after the 2024 season, leaving Branson Airport without any scheduled airline service.

Development and construction

The construction of the airport, which involved the flattening of several

Ozark Mountains The Ozarks, also known as the Ozark Mountains, Ozark Highlands or Ozark Plateau, is a physiographic region in the U.S. states of Missouri, Arkansas, and Oklahoma, as well as a small area in the southeastern corner of Kansas. The Ozarks cover ...

, is claimed to be the largest earthmoving project in Missouri history. A press release noted that between groundbreaking in July 2007 and May 2008 11 million cubic yards of earth had been moved. The $155 million project includes a by runway, numbered 14/32, and a terminal designed to accommodate 1.4 million passengers a year. The $155 million cost of the building the terminal included $38 million in private equity and $117 million in tax free bonds underwritten by

Citigroup Citigroup Inc. or Citi (Style (visual arts), stylized as citi) is an American multinational investment banking, investment bank and financial services company based in New York City. The company was formed in 1998 by the merger of Citicorp, t ...

. The high-risk, high-yield bonds (top rate of 6.5%) were issued by the Branson Regional Airport Transportation Development District. The City of Branson will pay a subsidy of $8.24 to Branson Airport LLC for each arriving visitor with an annual cap of $2 million. The developer was Branson Airport, LLC and AFCO. The Program Manager was Vasey Aviation Group LLC. The master designer was Burns and McDonnell Engineering. McAninch Corporation handled the earth moving operations. A local contractor Dewitt was the contractor handling the terminal construction.

References

External links

FlyBranson.com
official site * * {{US-airport-ga, BBG, - Airports in Missouri Branson, Missouri micropolitan area Buildings and structures in Taney County, Missouri 2009 establishments in Missouri