Gulfstream Aerospace Corporation will expand and invest $35 million for a new facility in Fort Worth with a partial relocation of its service center from Dallas.
The business jet aircraft manufacturer will construct a new service center at Fort Worth Alliance Airport, a part of the AllianceTexas development, the company announced Feb. 20.
The new 160,000-square-foot facility will add about 50 new “high quality” jobs, supplemented by up to 200 employee relocation from its operation in Dallas Love Field airport.
About 30 to 80 employees will remain in Love Field, where the company plans to continue providing its midcabin aircraft completions business.
“The Dallas site – Love Field – has been great, but we recognize we need to grow,” said Derek Zimmerman, president of Gulfstream Customer Support. ” To support our growing fleet, we need to have an airport that supports that growth also. Love Field is great, but they got a lot of commercial traffic.”
“We wanted to make sure as we grew, we grew someplace that could also focus on business aviation traffic. So, having a purpose-built business aviation only airport, like Alliance, was extremely attractive to us.”
The Savannah, Georgia-based company does not expect any economic incentives from local or regional governments for the project, Zimmerman said.
The new facility will break ground in the third quarter of this year. It will be fully operational by the end of 2021.
Gulfstream’s new Fort Worth Service Center will be built on approximately 21 acres of land on the northeast side of Fort Worth Alliance Airport.
The facility will have an 80,000-square feet hanger, which can accommodate up to nine G650 or G650ER aircraft
Gulfstream has about 3,000 in-service aircraft in its fleet. Last week, it introduced its new flagship G700 aircraft, which boasts the tallest, widest and longest cabin space in the industry.
Once completed, the new Fort Worth facility will be able to provide inspections, repair, installations, and other maintenance services to any and all Gulfstream aircraft. It will also have approximately 32,000 square feet of office space and about 44,000 square feet will be used as back shops and support areas.
“Their expansion here will allow them to leverage specialized area aviation training programs and provide them with access to a sizable talented workforce in a unique environment that fosters further growth,” said Bill Burton, executive vice president of Hillwood, AllianceTexas developer. “We look forward to a long relationship and sharing in their continued success.”
Gulfstream has had a presence in North Texas for about 25 years. The company currently employees 650 workers in Dallas. The company already has a smaller maintenance service center in AllianceTexas.
An official announcement of the new facility was made during a reception event in AllianceTexas on Feb. 20. It was attended by various government and community leaders.
“The story of Fort Worth is a story of American aviation,” U.S. Rep. Kay Granger, R-Fort Worth said. “Industry leaders, like Hillwood and Gulfstream, are a big part of that story.”
“This new facility will be a state-of-the-art aircraft maintenance facility and a world-class edition to Alliance,” Granger said, adding Gulfstream is a major success and “big win” for North Texas.
Fort Worth Mayor Betsy Price said Gulfstream’s new facility will yield millions of dollars in economic impact to the area.
“Relocating from Dallas?” Price asked rhetorically about Gulfstream’s new facility. “What more can I say.”
In addition to Granger and Price, the announcement was attended by personnel from Tarrant County College’s Erma C. Johnson Hadley Northwest Campus Center of Excellence for Aviation, Logistics and Transportation. The school’s 163,500-square foot facility at Alliance is home to a Federal Aviation Administration-approved maintenance program.
Gulfstream opened maintenance facilities in 2019 in Appleton, Wisconsin; Savannah; and Van Nuys, California; and will open two more this year in Palm Beach, Florida; and Farnborough, England. The company’s in-service fleet is more than 2,900 aircraft worldwide. More than 50 Gulfstream aircraft are based in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.
Alliance, the site of major Amazon and FedEx shipping operations, was considered the country’s first industrial airport when it opened in 1989. More than 300 flights a day come in and out of the airport, including business jets, military, cargo and general aviation traffic.
Alliance Airport is part of AllianceTexas, a 26,000-acre development in northeast Fort Worth and home to more than 500 companies.
The expansion project in Alliance Airport is still subject to the approval of the board of directors of Gulfstream’s parent company General Dynamics.