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Project Runway

A new, privately owned airport in Branson means big changes for you and for 417-land. Find out what's in store once this unprecedented project is complete.

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A rendering of what the finished Branson Airport should look like from the air.

Catching Peet is a lot harder than finding Bourk, though. Peet commutes from Connecticut to Branson on a regular basis. He could be the poster child for the new class of the jet-set Branson can attract. Right now, Branson is closed to them without great effort in traveling. The end of their journey is an inevitable car or bus ride right now, so Branson doesn’t even come up on their radar. I asked him about his first impressions of Branson.

“Before this project came across my desk, I couldn’t find Branson on a map,” Peet says. “There is a good reason I hadn’t heard of it, you couldn’t get there from here.”

The reason for his position as project rainmaker is readily apparent. Peet strikes you as a likable guy, a straight shooter, the kind of guy you can trust with millions of dollars. Peet became a passive investor before his visit in 2003, after that, he became committed. What he saw impressed him. He fell in love with Branson and the project.

“I believe that when America looks in the mirror, Branson is the reflection they want to see,” Peet says. “The only problem is that it is not available to everybody. Good air service will change that.”

The rest of the story unfolded as Peet lured a group of Citicorp investors down from New York, and the funding for the project was secured. Again, it wasn’t the airport’s slick marketing or well-crafted pitch that sold them. It was Branson itself.

What these moneymen saw convinced them. It not only convinced them to fund the airport, but it convinced them to believe in Branson. They went out on the lake. They rode the rides. They enjoyed the shows. Bourk says they were like little kids, and when it was all done one said that you could spend a week in Branson for the cost of one night on the town in New York. They were convinced the demand was there, just waiting for a place like Branson.
Like Ray Kinsella’s cornfield diamond in Field of Dreams, if you build it, they will come.

Jeff Bourk found his way here right after funding was secured in June of 2007.

“I left a very good job in Portland, Maine, to come down here,” Bourk says. “We’ve got a marketing director from Dayton, Ohio, leaving a very good job to come do this. People continue to commit to this all the time.”

The dreamers continue to gather. The airport vision continues to gain converts. While I was journeying down Highway 65 for the bumpy ride out to the site with Bourk, John Q. Hammons announced a new hotel to be built just outside the airport gates.

“There is real money being spent out there,” Hammons says. “It’s for real, otherwise I wouldn’t be there.”

That just makes Hammons the most recent in a long line of people to feel the dream in their wallets and souls. This is just the first act, of course. The stage is set for an even bigger scene. Everything changes when millions of American souls discover Branson for the first time and open their wallets.