Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, April 25, 1990 TAG: 9004250112
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Ed Shamy
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Question: Was there ever a shuttle service operating in the parking lot of Roanoke Regional Airport? When? Who operated the shuttle?
Students of Roanoke trivia will want to commit this exchange to memory, for Huffman apparently will be little more than an asterisk in the airport's history, a mere blip on our urban radar screen.
Huffman bought a used van, customized to carry about a dozen passengers, negotiated for a license with the airport commission, and on Feb. 1 opened for business.
He fixed to sell rides to and from the terminal for a buck. He counted on car-rental agencies to hire him to ferry renters to and from their cars. He offered cut rates to airport and airline employees. He even installed an electronic message board inside the van and planned to sell advertising. He worked seven days a week, 12 hours per day to make it work. He scoured the parking lots for customers, he committed the flight schedule to memory.
Huffman's plan went awry.
First, he agreed to pay a $425 monthly fee to the airport.
Then, the car-rental agencies balked, employees stayed away in droves, mild winter weather had folks hoofing it from car to terminal, and Huffman's 30-day agreement with the airport commission came up for renewal.
"I got a $425 bill for the next month's operation, plus a $200 bill for yearly operation. I filed it all," said Huffman.
And he went home to Troutville, taking his van and his shuttle service with him.
March dawned as has every month in the history of Woodrum Field, save February 1990 - without a shuttle service.
"I would have been beating my brains out," he said.
Huffman insists that the shuttle was paying for itself, that he was paying his expenses. But the parking lots, he quickly found, were not paved with gold.
He says he is not bitter that the shuttle failed so quickly, nor is he shy about firing a salvo at the airport commission.
"The excessive [monthly] fee they were charging was outrageous," he said.
Airport officials don't apologize for the $425 monthly charge. Huffman agreed to pay it, they say. End of discussion.
If the car rental agencies and the employees and the advertising and the weather didn't pan out, well, that can hardly be blamed on the airport commission.
"It's not sour grapes. I'm perfectly happy where I'm at. I'm away from the stress and the strain of the airport," said Huffman.
He is also away, for the moment, from steady gainful employment, with an expensive custom van sitting out in the driveway.
Undaunted, Huffman says he has plans, though he isn't sharing them. The only clue he'll offer: His future isn't linked to the airport.
"It's better for me that it didn't work out," Huffman said. "That was not my ultimate goal anyway."
And if the shuttle service had prospered, Dick Huffman wouldn't have been the answer to a trivia question.
by CNB