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Front Range Airport

Front Range Airport is a public airport located on the northeastern edge of Aurora, Colorado, 19 miles (31 km) east of the city's central business district and three miles (5 km) southeast of Denver International Airport. It is owned by the Front Range Airport Authority, and serves the Denver area. The postal designation of Watkins, a nearby unincorporated community, appears in the airport's mailing address.

Although most U.S. airports use the same three-letter location identifier for the FAA and IATA, Front Range Airport is assigned FTG by the FAA but has no designation from the IATA.

Front Range is a small general aviation airport, although increased demand has warranted a number of expansion programs in recent years. Formerly, it was a non-towered airport without air traffic control (ATC) services, although a control tower opened in 2005 along with full ATC services. Currently, Front Range airport serves as the base of a few flying schools, flight clubs and maintenance services. Due to its location on the flat plains of eastern Colorado, as well as generally cheaper aircraft rental rates, it is a very popular airport for both flight training and recreational flights. The cargo airline Sundance Air is based at the airport. It is also popular among owners and pilots of kit-built aircraft, and the Experimental Aircraft Association (EAA) has a very strong presence at Front Range, which occasionally hosts the EAA Rocky Mountain Fly-In.

Aviation Technology Group (ATG) plans to build the ATG Javelin at the airport in 2009.

Facilities and aircraft

Front Range Airport covers an area of 3,209 acres (1,299 ha) which contains two asphalt paved runways, 8/26 and 17/35, each measuring 8,000 x 100 ft (2,438 x 30 m).

For the 12-month period ending December 31, 2005, the airport had 94,625 aircraft operations, an average of 259 per day: 99% general aviation, 1% air taxi and <1% military. There are 396 aircraft based at this airport: 84% single engine, 11% multi-engine, 4% ultralight, 1% helicopters and <1% jet aircraft.

The airport also hosts an armory belonging to the Colorado Army National Guard, recognizable by the UH-1 Iroquois parked in front of the building. HHC, 5th Battalion, 19th Special Forces Group is based there.